In an almost inconceivable blow to civil and human rights, riot police violently broke up several gay rights demonstrations in Moscow on Saturday. In doing so, President Medvedev, Prime Minister Putin and Mayor Luzhkov confirmed the worst suspicions about Russian “democracy” by arresting the participants and not allowing LGBT people to assemble without state repression.
City officials openly said they would not tolerate rallies supporting the rights of gays and lesbians and barred Saturday’s rally, saying it was “morally wrong” City Hall spokesman Sergei Tsoi was quoted by the ITAR-Tass news agency as saying, “(Gay pride events) not only destroy moral foundations of our society, but also purposefully provoke disturbances that will threaten the lives and safety of Moscow residents and guests,”
I think Mr. Tsoi has that mixed up. The only threat to the lives and safety of Moscow residents in this situation a the police and city officials. Words such as these are frightening and echo the tyrannical regime of Stalinism. Equally as disturbing and frightening were these comments made by Moscow police chief Vladmir Pronin to the Russian news agency Interfax on March 8, 2009: “gay pride parades in the capital are unacceptable – gay pride parades shouldn’t be allowed ”
“No one will dare to do it, such ‘brave-heart’ will be torn to shreds,” he added. “The West can say we’re bad guys, but our people will see it is right. Our country is patriarchal, that’s [sic] sums it up… I positively agree with the Church, with the Patriarch, politicians, especially with [Mayor] Luzhkov, who are convinced that man and woman should love each other. It is established by God and nature.”
Mayor Yury Luzhkov is openly homophobic and issued several bans on gay pride parades in Moscow, calling them “satanic”. A Communist from 1968-1991 who has a billionaire wife and an independent foreign policy agenda, he personifies the lack of forward motion in Russian politics. The mayor has also blatantly ignored international law with complete impunity.
Both the Tverskoi District Court and the Moscow City Court have banned 167 gay rights events in Moscow. Currently all of these bans have been appealed to the European Court of Human Rights. The Court however has delayed any ruling on the appeals for up to four years.
An article on Wednesday in Moskovskij Komsololets, one of Moscow’s major dailies, headlined “Homosexualism ‘Weakens Power of Fist’: Activists Against Gay Pride Threaten Violence.” It told of a press conference by fascists in which they promised that “1000 of them will protest against gay pride this Saturday and would physically attack it if possible”. In previous years they violently attacked gay pride participants, sending German European Parliament member Volkhart Beck to the hospital in 2006 and veteran British gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell in 2007.
According to the Associated Press, police also ripped the shirt and bra off one female protester Saturday, who identified herself as Ksenia Prilebskaya, before roughly pushing her into a police bus. Her glasses fell and she shrieked in apparent pain. Is this not a threat to her safety not to mention her dignity? How does Mr. Tsoi’s comments hold up to these atrocities?
Among those detained as well were American activist Andy Thayer of Chicago, co-founder of the direct-action group Gay Liberation Network. This was his first trip to Moscow for what was to be the Gay Pride March. Seconds before police plowed through the journalists to take him away he said this: “If…the right to assemble is taken away from lesbian and gay people here in Russia, then other Russians have to fear for their own freedom,”
This is not a new sentiment yet one that’s lost so frequently. “Freedom” becomes a fallacy when different rights apply to one over another. Thayer also had this to say regarding the delays in the European Court of Human Rights:
“It’s not hard to see the cynical hand of geopolitics at work in the West European-dominated court’s refusal to do anything yet for Russian LGBT’s,” said Thayer. “Much of Western Europe’s natural gas supplies come from Russia, and the West European governments by their inaction have shown that they prefer Russian gas supplies over the right to freedom of assembly and other justice for Russian LGBT’s. In the meantime, Russian LGBT’s are not waiting for any outside saviors – they are organizing for their own rights, which is always the principal way rights have been won, regardless of country.”
These are rights that shouldn’t have to be “won”. Unfortunately due to ignorance, ongoing oppression and a fatal mixture of church and state events such as this play out. And one group, simply because of who they are, face persecution. This isn’t democracy; it’s dictatorship. When will history not be doomed to repeat itself?
Call and make it known that egregious human rights violations cannot be tolerated. Contact the American-Russian Embassy: (312) 494-6562. European Court of Human Rights site: http://www.echr.coe.int/echr/