Sex-change boy can be a male

Bogota (Reuter) - A Colombian boy who underwent a sex change operation to become a female without his consent when he was seven years old has won the right to be identified as a male, judicial sources said yesterday.

The boy, now aged 14, underwent the sex change and was treated with female hormones at the request of his parents in April 1987, six-and-a- half years after a dog destroyed his genitals. He rebelled against the idea of being changed into a woman, however, and filed a suit last year demanding that he be entitled to choose his own sexual identity and rid himself of the girl's name his parents gave him.

The Constitutional Court ruled in the boy's favour on Monday and ordered that the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare assist him in any way possible to overcome his emasculation and identity crisis.

There was no word on whether doctors would seek to reverse the effects of the hormone treatment the boy received or close the artificial vagina surgeons created for him.