About 100 Ukrainian gay rights activists held the country’s first gay rally today, helped by police who arrested 13 people for trying to break it up.
The activists walked for about 250 metres along Victory Avenue in the capital Kiev while Orthodox Christian activists nearby chanted slogans denouncing them. "Ukraine is not America. Kiev is not Sodom,' shouted one anti-gay demonstrator over a loudspeaker.
A church activist broke through the police cordon briefly and slapped down banners calling for an end to discrimination against homosexuals before he was seized by police.
There is little public acceptance of homosexuality in predominantly Orthodox Ukraine, as in other former Soviet republics. On May 17th, large crowds of protesters broke up gay rights rallies in Georgia and Russia.
The march in Kiev lasted only 40 minutes but was a small victory for the former Soviet republic’s gay community.
A year ago, gay activists cancelled plans for a rally in Kiev, saying they had received threats of violence. One would-be organiser was beaten up by a group of men the same day.
Organisers hailed the march as a breakthrough. “This event will go down in the history of Ukraine as one of the key developments in the fight for equal human rights,” said Olena Semenova, one of the organisers, expressing gratitude to the police and the authorities for their action.
The rally almost came to nothing when city authorities raised security concerns and a court issued an order to ban it. But today police offered protection to the small march, held away from the city centre.
Church activist Ioksana Keresten, who protested against the rally said she was are” trying to protect family values. We want to protect our children from homosexual propaganda. This parade popularises homosexuality. It can influence our children for their whole life.”
At the end of the rally, the gay activists stepped into the grounds of a local film studio and climbed onto buses that drove them away, avoiding the risk of further confrontation.
Ukraine’s parliament last year shelved the second reading of a bill that would have criminalised the “promotion of homosexuality”. But it has also delayed passing legislation to outlaw discrimination against homosexuals in the workplace.