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Persecuted LGBT activists: Belarus follows Moscow

By 13 December 2014August 10th, 2018No Comments

Ihar Tsikhanyuk is an LGBT rights activist in Belarus, a country which suffers strongly the russian influence and has been close to criminalise homosexual acts, although at the moment there is no law against lesbian, gay, bi and transexual people. Early 2013, while he was hospitalised for an ulcer, Ihar was taken by some police officers to an office where he has been victim of a beating rather than an interrogation, after the guy refused to answer some questions about his own private life and the policemen watched videos and pictures in his mobile. In the last few days Ihar has been in Italy for the campaign “Write for Rights 2014” (amnesty.it), invited by Amnesty International, that follows his case since December 2013 and put him in touch with ilgrandecolibri.com.

I was beaten since I had tried to register the Human Rights Centre Lambda“, says Ihar, explaining that what happened to him was not too different from what was experienced by the other activists who turned to the Ministry of Justice for the registration together with him.

The current situation is very much influenced by Russia – says he when we ask him about the situation for LGBT people in his country – and Russia is very homophobic. It’s true that there are no laws that discriminate, but unfortunately there is not even legislation protecting gay people“. In effect, there are few chances that the ones who beat Ihar will suffer some consequence: the inquiry commission didn’t request the indictment neither of the police officers nor of the attorney, who said that homosexuals are the scum of society and should be slaughtered like cattle.

Another thing should be considered: the Eurasian Economic Union founded by Russia, Belarus and Kazakistan (and Armenia will join it too) will start next January: surely it will strengthen the ties with Vladimir Putin, the champion of homophobia, although it’s actually impossible to forecast the future situation of rights.

When asked how the worldwide LGBT community can help him and other activists in Belarus, Ihar shows the already expressed appreciation for the solidarity offered by Amnesty International: “It ‘s very important that the international community focuses its attention on our problems, because authorities are very careful to prevent the deterioration of Belarusian reputation. It looks like as they feel a kind of shame in the face of Western countries: you are our voice“.

Despite Ihar and other activists have experienced hard discriminations, not only from the police (the boy’s mother refused to speak to him for a month, when she saw him kiss his mate; and they were thrown out of a clothes shop because they went hand in hand), it is possible that society is evolving, slowly and with difficulty.

Surely the situation is not easy: media describe LGBT people as sick, crazy and wild; but the public believes less and less to the regime media, as evidenced by the popular support that – according to Ihar – Ukrainian revolution is receiving, although media fully support Russia: “In February, four boys demonstrated in favor of Ukraine and were arrested. Since then, the popular support has become underground, because of fear, because the authorities worry strongly symbolic actions and paint the Ukrainian government in the worst way possible, to avoid any support“.

 

Marina, Michele and Pier
with the collaboration of Amnesty International

Copyright©2014ilgrandecolibri.com

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