LGBT flight attendants with KLM airlines have pleaded with the company not to send them to Iran, where LGBT people routinely face punishment as varied as beatings, imprisonment or the death penalty. Flights to Iran generally require a stayover in the country, meaning that these flight attendants could be at risk in the country just for being who they are.

KLM, however, has denied their request, saying that there are already too many flight attendants who have asked not to travel to Iran. As Radio Netherlands reports, "KLM has already allowed a number of stewardesses not to serve on flights to Iran because ‘unpleasant things happened to them there,' but the company says it cannot make any more exceptions. No further changes will be made unless it becomes really unsafe for personnel."

How much more unsafe does Iran have to get for LGBT people, before KLM understands the precarious position that these flight attendants are in? In the past thirty years alone, more than 100 LGBT people have been executed in Iran, and LGBT people are regularly detained in raids, sent to prison, and given lashes.

Flight attendants should be allowed to make up their own mind on whether they think traveling to Iran is safe. But KLM should not be in the business of forcing their employees to travel and stayover in a country that criminalizes homosexuality with the death penalty. Forcing employees to undego that level of danger could cost KLM flight attendants their lives.

Send KLM a message urging the company to listen to their LGBT flight attendants.