Recent Homophobia in Russia

BELGRADE, September 19, 2009 – Nikolai Baev, a co-organizer of Moscow Pride, arrived in Belgrade at lunchtime looking forward to taking part in his very first Pride march.

But when he got to his hotel his excitement turned to sorrow when he learned that tomorrow’s Belgrade Pride march had been suddenly canceled by the organizers when the Serbian Government announced this morning that the parade in the city center could not go ahead but offered an alternative location in the suburbs.

“I came all this way for nothing,” he told UK Gay News.

“So it appears that Moscow is the only capital city where Pride organizers have not given in to the authorities who don’t want a Pride in a city center,” he added.

Mr. Baev flew in from Moscow with Nikolai Alekseev and said that there were skinheads at the airport when they arrived.

Nationalist groups, skinheads and religious organizations had vowed to disrupt the gay parade, some of them inciting violence.

But the authorities from the Serbian President downwards had backed the rights of the gay community to stage the parade, which was scheduled for lunchtime tomorrow (September 20).

“The government has ordered state institutions to take all necessary measures to stop violence, uncover and arrest those who threaten with violence,” an earlier government statement said. “The government will ensure public order and peace, the security of the citizens and property, and the right of every citizen to enjoy his or her constitutional and legally guaranteed rights.

But it was “security concerns” that led government officials from prohibiting the planned parade, and suggesting an alternative out-of-town venue, a wooded area on the banks of the Danube in Ušće.

Nikolai Alekseev, who runs the GayRussia.ru Website and is a co-organiser of Moscow Pride, told UK Gay News that he could not understand the cancellation.

“The authorities seem to have put any personal views of gay matters to one side and to back the rights of the gay community to hold the Pride Parade.
(sources: 1, 2)

MOSCOW, June 1, 2008 – Yuri Luzkhov, Moscow's mayor, had already banned the city's third Gay Pride march after dismissing homosexuals as Satanists.

Campaigners were too afraid to protest on the street, so a small group instead hung a banner calling for tolerance from an apartment window opposite Mr Luzhkov's offices. As the four activists unfurled the banner, Orthodox priests on the street below denounced the "moral corruption" of homosexuality.

Their female followers, clutching crucifixes, threw eggs at the banner which was quickly pulled down by angry neighbors – to the cheers of passers-by.

Police tried and failed to break down the door of the apartment to arrest the protesters, leading to a standoff that lasted several hours.

Earlier in the day 30 gay rights campaigners had held a furtive five-minute vigil outside the Tchaikovsky music hall before scattering.

The manner in which the demonstrations were held reflects the Kremlin's increasing intolerance for all forms of public protest. Political demonstrations in the past two years have been stamped on by the police with increasing brutality.
(source)

These very recent examples of the Russian government opposing pride marches show that homosexuality is still widely looked down upon. Not only that, but demonstrations of all kinds, from small to medium (larger organization does not seem to be possible at all, presently) are put down easily, quickly, and to public approval.