Our friends in Moscow held a peaceful Pride Parade yesterday, outsmarting both the homophobes and the “authorities.”
05/30/2010 15:12:34
Russian Gays Hold Successful Pride Parade Without Arrests, Beatings
MOSCOW, Russia – Despite a vow by Moscow’s anti-gay mayor that it would not happen, 30 Russian lesbian, gay and bisexual activists foiled the police and FSB security services by holding a 10 minute flashmob Gay Pride march on one of Moscow’s major thoroughfares, Leningradsky Street, this afternoon, Saturday 29 May.
Carrying a 20 metre long rainbow flag and placards in Russian and English calling for “Rights for gays”, the protesters chanted “No homophobia” and “Russia without homophobes.”
“LGBT activists from Moscow, St Petersburg and Minsk staged today the first-ever successful Gay Pride in Moscow, despite the [government] ban,” said Nikolai Alekseev, principal organizer for Moscow Pride. “Though the March was short – it happened. All the Russian media reported that for the first time in five years, the gay parade took place in Moscow without being arrested by the police and assaulted by protesters.”