Dispatches: Shocked by Russia’s Intolerance | Human Rights Watch
Dispatches: Shocked by Russia’s Intolerance | Human Rights Watch:
In recent days the presidents of Germany, France and the United States announced they wouldn’t attend the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia, in February 2014. None explained why they decided to skip the Games, but one can guess that the appalling human rights situation in Russia played a part. Of particular concern is the terrible truth the Russian government has been so vehemently denying: routine demonization of Russia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community and the government’s discriminatory policies against its LGBT citizens.
Last week a court in Kazan, a city 800 kilometers east of Moscow, fined Dmitry Isakov, a 24-year-old LGBT activist, for violating the law banning “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations.” On June 30, Isakov had held a one-minute picket on the city’s central square, holding a poster that said: “Being gay and loving gays is normal; beating gays and killing gays is criminal.” A simple message of kindness and love, no “sexual relations” discussed.
