A pair of gay rights activists from the Russian city of Archangel are wrapping up a five-day visit to their sister city of Portland, Maine. They’ve been trying to raise awareness about the struggles faced by Russia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender – or LGBT – community, in light of the recent rise in anti-gay rights activity there. At a meeting in Portland this morning, the dialogue continued. Tom Porter has more.
“We’re being denied entry into this public sphere,” says Oleg Klyuenkov, speaking through an interpreter.
Klyuenkov describes how Archangel became one of first places in Russia to enact a law discriminating against the LGBT community. It’s a law which was recently adopted at the national level by president Vladimir Putin, who introduced a separate measure banning so-called “homosexual propoganda.”
Klyuenkov and fellow gay rights activist Lyudmila Romodina met with Portland city officials, civil liberties advocates, and other community groups.
“I work with the parents of LGBT individuals. At the organization, I coordinate the parents’ club,” Lyudmila says, through an interpreter.
IMG_0872This visit was organized by New York-based non-profit Human Rights First, and by Robert Lieber (second from right) of Peaks Island, Maine, an art teacher who has also been involved in efforts to help imprisoned members of the Russian all-female punk band, Pussy Riot.
Lieber describes the discrimination faced by Russia’s LGBT community as systemic. He cites an incident which happened to one of the visiting activists back in Archangel last year.
“Lyudmila was walking down the street a year ago with a friend of hers, a woman who looks male, and some hooligans came up, broke her arm,” Lieber says. “And they went to the police and the police sort of laughed at them, didn’t want to treat them as if they were human.”
“I’m so excited about this visit with Oleg and Lyudmila,” says Portland City Councilor Ed Suslovic, a member of the Archangel sister city committee. He says the visit is a way to deepen the connection between the two communities, which began 25 years ago.
“If all you have is ceremonial visits, that’s not a very deep relationship,” Suslovic says. “When you start to talk about tough issues like discrimination, to me that means the relationship is real.”
Suslovic says there was talk of Portland abandoning the connection to its Russian sister city following the anti-gay legislation, something several other American cities have done. But in the end, officials in Portland decided it would be beneficial to keep the relationship intact as a way of addressing thorny issues like human rights.
Suslovic, who has traveled to Russia four times himself, says an official delegation from Archangel will be coming to Portland later this month. He expects a civil, but frank, discussion on the issue of LGBT discrimination.
“I feel that Archangelsk and Portland – I describe us as an old married couple now, we’ve been married 25 years, that’s what we’re celebrating, ” Suslovic says, using the Russian name for Portland’s sister city. “Old married couples don’t have to be delicate with one another. If you’re going to have a long-term marriage, or friendship, you have to be able to speak honestly and openly.”
Lyudmila and Oleg say the crackdown on LGBT rights and other civil liberties in Russia is part of a government effort to distract public attention following allegations of widespread fraud in the 2011 elections.
Tom Porter: “How hard has life become under the new rules, the new law?”
Oleg Klyuenkov, through a translator: “I would say the process is of a secondary shutdown, in a way, because before the law, LGBT people were becoming more visible. And now with this legislative measure, people are again shutting themselves down and being afraid to express their sexual orientation, gender identity.”
This law, he says, turns Russia’s LGBT community into second-class citizens.
At 7.30pm tonight, Oleg Klyuenkov and Lyudmila Romodina are taking part in a public discussion on the challenges facing Russia’s LGBT community at Space Gallery in downtown Portland. And on Thursday, they’re heading to Washington D.C., where they’ll meet with U.S. State Department officials and others on capitol hill.
by Tom Porter
Source – MPBN
