Gay Russia News & Reports 2007 June-December

German parliament president criticizes lawmaker’s detention at Russian gay rights protest Germany’s parliament president expressed concern to his Russian counterpart Wednesday over the weekend detention of a German opposition lawmaker at a gay rights demonstration in Moscow. Green party lawmaker Volker Beck has said police beat him and others and took their passports away Sunday, in what he said authorities called a "security measure." Parliament President Norbert Lammert, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives, voiced "the dismay of the Bundestag," or lower house of parliament, in a letter to Russian speaker Boris Gryzlov, a parliament statement said.

The demonstrators tried to present a letter signed by 40 European lawmakers to the office of Moscow’s mayor, appealing at the city’s ban on a march they wanted to conduct. Lammert said that should be viewed as "free expression of opinion." He said he hoped a Russian parliament working group on the protection of minorities’ democratic rights would look into the case. Marco Cappato, a European Parliament deputy from Italy, was also among those detained on Sunday.

Washington Blade
http://www.washblade.com/2007/6-8/news/worldnews/10723.cfm

June 08, 2007

2
Three gay activists arrested at Moscow Pride…Mayor blamed for anti-gay attacks

by Elizabeth Perry
Three gay rights activists, including a European who was badly beaten by Russian nationalists despite the presence of riot police, were among the 31 people arrested at a Moscow Gay Pride demonstration May 27. English gay activist Peter Tatchell, a Green Party candidate for the British Parliament, gave the Moscow Gay Pride keynote address at a conference the day before and took part in the protest. In a written account of his attack, Tatchell said he was punched in the eye while talking to a journalist, pushed to the ground and kicked by a man in a camouflage shirt while television crews documented the assault. Then police arrested him.

“I believe some of the violent right-wing extremists may have been plainclothes police officers who were doing in civilian clothes what they could not be seen doing in police uniform — punching and kicking the marchers,” he said. According to wire reports, a delegation of gay activists gathered in central Moscow to deliver a petition, signed by 40 European members of Parliament, to Mayor Yuri Luzhkov to lift the ban on Gay Pride parades. This was the second year that gay activists have gathered to ask Luzhkov to lift the ban and were met with violence. Russian gay activist Nicholas Alexeyev organized the protest and was one of those arrested trying to deliver the petition. In an e-mail interview with the Blade he put the blame for the violence squarely on Luzhkov, who has been known to refer to gay marches as “satanic acts.”

“His office is responsible for creating this violence,” Alexeyev wrote. “The Moscow police obey the mayor. When the police arrest us, beat us or refuse to protect us, you can only blame the mayor. Here, there is no link with the Kremlin. I don’t think [Russian President Vladimir] Putin thanked Luzhkov for the media coverage Russia got last week.” Homosexuality was decriminalized in Russia 14 years ago, but homophobic attitudes are still prevalent among Russian nationalists, skinheads and ultra-conservative members of the Russian Orthodox Church. Scott Long, director of Human Rights Watch’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights Program, traveled to Russia last year to monitor human rights violations and blogged about his experiences for the Blade. This year he went to observe, was pointed out by an informer and detained in a police van for 15 minutes before he was released. He said he witnessed “deliberate collusion” between police officers and anti-gay demonstrators. He said three times as many gays were arrested this year in comparison to last year. In his blog he accused the police of encouraging the mass gay bashing by pushing gay activists into the direct path of angry mobs of skinheads.

“I saw a skinhead smash his fist into a young man’s face,” he said. “I saw a band of skinheads kick the victim when he fell, while a woman begged the officers, ‘Why don’t you help?’” Long said the key to stopping the violence will lay in sustained pressure by European and American governments. “Russia needs to amend its law on demonstrations so there is a minimum of state interference with them,” he said. “They need effective anti-discrimination laws and control of the police.”

In other international gay news, Irish political leaders continue to denounce Democratic Unionist Party Legislator Ian Paisley Jr.’s anti-gay comments to an Irish music magazine. “I am, unsurprisingly, a straight person,” he told Hot Press magazine. “I am pretty repulsed by gay and lesbianism. I think it is wrong. I think that those people harm themselves and — without caring about it — harm society. That doesn’t mean to say that I hate them. I mean, I hate what they do.” In an article on Gay Community News Ireland’s web site, Social Democratic and Labour Party Equality spokesperson Dolores Kelly said her party has put forth a motion in the Northern Ireland Assembly Business Office to censure Paisley, making sure he will not handle any gay issues.

“Ian Paisley takes the view that a particular minority is harming society,” she said. “Yet he is a minister in a department charged with protecting the equality and rights of that minority and all other minorities, whether he finds them repulsive or not.”

pinknews.co.uk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-4631.html

13th June 2007

3
Russian activists target "gay" park

by Tony Grew
Religious and nationalist groups in Moscow have said they will patrol a small park in the city that they claim is used by gay men as a meeting place. Intelfax news agency reports that around 50 people gathered yesterday to "reclaim" the park and launch their campaign. The activists said they will ask people they suspect are gay to leave the park during their nightly patrols. A spokeswoman for a Russian Orthodox youth group told Intelfax they wanted to target gay men:

"They boldly demonstrate their non-traditional orientation, persuading everyone that it is normal. We believe that it is a vice and want to remove all this from this site, which is sacred to Russians." The Mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov, is being asked to confirm that the patrols are legal. He banned last month’s gay Pride march, and has made a string of homophobic statements in the past few years. When gay activists tried to deliver a letter of protest to his office last month, they were pelted with eggs and assaulted by a small mob of anti-gay Russians. The organiser of Moscow Pride, Nicolas Alexeyev, said he was not worried by the park patrol, commenting that the small number of people involved meant it was likely to be short-lived.

indybay.org/
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/06/14/18427510.php

June 14th, 2007

4
Russia: Gay Rights Under Attack

by Human Rights Watch (reposted)
(Moscow, June 15, 2007) The violent attacks on peaceful gay pride demonstrators in Moscow in late May show the rollback of respect for human rights in Russia, Human Rights Watch and the European Region of the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA-Europe) said in a briefing paper released today. Instead of protecting human rights and gay advocates who tried to assemble, Moscow police colluded with skinheads to break up the Gay Pride demonstration. The two organizations documented the violence and urged legal protections for both freedom of assembly for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people.

When LGBT people tried to assemble on the Moscow streets, some twenty ended up in jail cells, said Scott Long, director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch, who witnessed the events in Moscow first-hand. The violence and the arrests reveal how comprehensive the threats to basic freedoms are in Russia today. On May 27, several dozen Russian lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, accompanied by Russian and foreign supporters, tried to hold a peaceful demonstration outside Moscows City Hall. Police immediately arrested several organizers of Moscows lesbian and gay pride festival, including chief organizer Nikolay Alexeyev, as they tried to deliver a petition to Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov.

pinknews.co.uk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-4665.html

18th June 2007

5
Moscow gay park patrols end in violence

by Tony Grew
Several members of a religious group in Moscow patrolling a small park in the city that they claim is used by gay men as a meeting place have been beaten up. Earlier this week around 50 people gathered to "reclaim" the park and launch their campaign. The activists said they would ask people they suspect are gay to leave the park during their nightly patrols. The Ilyinskiye Vorota square has a small park and statues to Russian war heroes.

Nationalist and religious groups had claimed that gay men use the space, in the shadow of the Kremlin, as a meeting spot. Interfax news agency has reported that late on Saturday night five young men went to the police to report an attack on them carried out by up by eight men. A spokeswoman for a Russian Orthodox youth group earlier told Intelfax they wanted to target gay men:

Human Rights News
http://hrw.org/english/docs/2007/06/13/russia16174.htm

June 14, 2007

6
Russia: Gay Rights Under Attack – Attacks and Police Collusion Show Liberties Rollback

Moscow – The violent attacks on peaceful gay pride demonstrators in Moscow in late May show the rollback of respect for human rights in Russia, Human Rights Watch and the European Region of the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA-Europe) said in a briefing paper released today. Instead of protecting human rights and gay advocates who tried to assemble, Moscow police colluded with skinheads to break up the Gay Pride demonstration. The two organizations documented the violence and urged legal protections for both freedom of assembly for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people.

“When LGBT people tried to assemble on the Moscow streets, some twenty ended up in jail cells,” said Scott Long, director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch, who witnessed the events in Moscow first-hand. “The violence and the arrests reveal how comprehensive the threats to basic freedoms are in Russia today.”
On May 27, several dozen Russian lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, accompanied by Russian and foreign supporters, tried to hold a peaceful demonstration outside Moscow’s City Hall. Police immediately arrested several organizers of Moscow’s lesbian and gay pride festival, including chief organizer Nikolay Alexeyev, as they tried to deliver a petition to Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov.

Dozens of anti-gay protesters, including skinheads, nationalists, and Orthodox adherents, attacked peaceful participants. They beat and kicked lesbians and gays and their supporters with impunity while riot police stood by. Informers among the anti-gay protesters appeared to point out particular LGBT people and their allies for police to arrest. “Police clearly sided with the attackers instead of the victims,” said Maxim Anmeghichean, programmes director of ILGA-Europe, who also directly witnessed the events. “Instead of separating the two sides, the police pushed them together to aggravate the attacks, and then watched while demonstrators were beaten.”

Click here for photos

pinknews.co.uk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-4709.html

22nd June 2007

7
Homophobic politician outed on national TV

by Tony Grew
Gay rights activist Nicolas Alexeyev told a live TV audience yesterday that a member of the Russian State Duma is gay. Speaking on the talk show K baryeru Mr Alexeyev, who was convicted of a minor offence last month for his role in the banned Mosow Pride march, outed the conservative MP Alexander Chuev. Mr Chuev is one of the most outspoken opponents of gay rights, and has introduced proposals to the Duma to outlaw the “promotion” of homosexuality and ban “gay propaganda.”

Mr Alexeyev claimed that Mr Chuev’s gay relationships were well-known in the 1990s before he became a politician, and called him a coward and a liar. Mr Chuev said that he would sue, and later wrote on his blog that he wanted to punch Mr Alexeyev “We reached the most important thing during this TV show”, Mr Alexeyev told GayRussia. We showed all hypocrisy of the representatives of the present Russian authorities. They have secret homosexual relationships but at the same time they do all their best in order to slander gays and lesbians. I am ready to prove at any court or prosecution office that deputy Chuev is gay and to produce corresponding proofs.” This is the first time a politician has been outed in Russia.

Gay Russia
http://www.gayrussia.ru/en/news/detail.php?ID=9430

June 24, 2007

8
Supreme Court: Moscow Gay Pride Ban Lawful

Organiser’s hopes are with the European Court in Strasbourg Russia’s Supreme Court has ruled that the ban imposed by Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov on last year’s Moscow Gay Pride was lawful. The Court fully sided with the decisions of the Tverskoi district court of Moscow that the march ban was lawful. The case was considered in the first instance on May 26, 2006, one day before the scheduled date of the parade. Later Moscow City court dismissed three appeals against the decision of Tverskoi district court. On April 4, 2007, organisers of Moscow Pride appealed to the highest court in Russia – Supreme Court. Supreme Court decision says that the lower courts came to the right conclusion concerning the lawfulness of the actions of state official, who banned the march.

In the view of Russia’s highest court, the decision was taken on the basis of Russian Constitution, Law on Meetings, Marches, Demonstrations and Picketing as well as the European Convention on Human Rights ratified by the Russian Federation on March 30, 1998. Supreme Court ruling says that “according to the mentioned legal acts, the executive body is responsible for the protection of the participants of the public event as well as expected public reaction against the march participants. In case of threat for the security of the public event participants, public disturbances when it is impossible to provide security, the respective executive body is entitled to deny the conduct of the public event in the chosen place.” The Moscow Government, the Supreme court said, took its decision in the light of the fact that it was unable to provide the security of the march participants.

In January this year organisers of Moscow Pride sent an official complaint against Russian Federation to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg saying that the ban of the march contradicts a number of articles of the European Convention. They asked 20,000 euros in compensation. Then, early last month, the European Court gave a decision on the similar ban of gay pride march in Poland’s capital Warsaw in 2005. The ban was found in breach of the European Convention unanimously. Organiser of Moscow Gay Pride Nikolai Alekseev said today that “we were quite surprised by this decision of the highest court authority in Russia because the level of judicial argumentation in this decision is on a very low level.

“We haven’t seen any references to the articles of Russian legislation which allow the ban of our event. Shortly, we are planning to use the last legal resort that we have in this country to challenge Moscow Gay pride march ban. We will send an appeal to the head of Russia’s Supreme Court who has the power to initiate new proceedings,” Mr. Alekseev said. “Now, it is almost clear that the final decision in this lengthy case will be given by the European Court in Strasbourg,” he admitted. “In the light of the recent Warsaw decision we are confident we will win. We used all possible attempts to resolve this case in Russia and always considered Strasbourg court as the last resort but Russian authorities did not want to finalise this case in Russia.”

Mr Alekseev said that he hoped that the European Court decision will be delivered before the date of the third Moscow Gay Pride march, scheduled for May 31, 2008.

International Herald Tribune
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/06/27/europe/EU-GEN-Russia-Gay-Rights.php

June 27, 2007

9
Gay rights activists detained by Moscow police, their picket banned

Moscow – Police on Wednesday blocked gay rights activists from holding a demonstration in the capital and detained two of them despite the protest being authorized by city authorities. The approximately two dozen activists aimed to hold the protest outside the European Union’s representative office in Moscow to demand that the EU impose a visa ban on Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who has banned gay rights parades and called homosexuality "satanic." Although the planned demonstration had been sanctioned, police said they decided to block it because it would interfere with construction taking place nearby.

"Authorities in Moscow have broken the law again by not allowing our picket," said activist Alexey Davydov. Demonstrators tried to unfurl a banner, but police dispersed them, grabbing Davydov and another demonstrator and forcing them into a police bus. A group of gay rights opponents stood nearby, but did not interfere.

"There must be no propaganda of sexual perversions in Russia, especially if it is Western-funded," said Mikhail Sinitsyn, leader of the nationalistic People’s Union youth movement. Russia decriminalized homosexuality in 1993, but opposition to gay rights remains strong and frequently turns violent. In May, police detained gay rights activists, including two European lawmakers, as they tried to hold a demonstration in downtown Moscow while members of a hostile crowd punched the activists and pelted them with eggs. Homosexuality is denounced by the dominant Russian Orthodox Church, and President Vladimir Putin in his annual news conference implied gays were undermining the country by not procreating.

New Statesman
http://www.newstatesman.com/200707090004

09 July 2007

10
Gay Cruise in stand-off with Russian Army

by Gavin Knight
Gavin Knight takes a river cruise with some of Moscow’s defiant gay community and encounters the Russian army There was an atmosphere of defiance in the air as members of Moscow’s gay community boarded the crowded gangplank for a gay river cruise. The rumour going round was that the boat was going to be torpedoed by the Russian Navy. Party-goers passed through a cordon of heavy-set OMON commandoes (whose cyrillic letters spelt out OMOH) under the lights of Kievskaya Bridge. They joked that Luzhkov had personally given the order to the navy to blow the ship up. The cruise was reviving a tradition that dated back to the USSR prior to Stalin’s criminalisation of homosexuality. It was organised by gay members of the press, owners of shops and restaurants and had major sponsors including Pepsi.

Those paying 1,000 rubles (about £20) to get on board, talked excitedly about a rumoured outings on NTV of an anti-gay nationalist MP. There were several planned stops along the river until it’s 4.30am finish for people to come on and off. Little did we know that at one port we would find encounter hostility. On May 27th gay rights activist Peter Tatchell was attacked, beaten up and then arrested by Moscow riot police on a gay pride rally outside City Hall on the main street Tverskaya. For now the only sign of trouble was when our photographer friend’s camera was confiscated at the door and had to be retrieved later by stealth. “Face control” was in operation here and like any Moscow club the aim was to gain entry to the ever more exclusive VIP areas.

So we left the riff raff larging it en masse on the lower deck and ascended a metal ladder to the top VIP deck. Midnight is too early to club in Moscow, and the top deck was fairly thinly populated. Someone pointed out how the barman in his sailor suit looked like young Vladimir Putin. He gave us our complimentary vodka shot but made us pay through the nose for a syprupy apricot mixer. Yuri, an impossibly tall transvestite swayed around in a green dress. Sacha, a camp window cleaner from the suburb of Kalchuga asked us if we were on television. No, we said, we’re just foreign. He jumped with excitement and clapped his hands. It was as if Jack McFarland (from Will & Grace) had just met Patti Lupone.

You could not blame Sacha for jumping. "Moscow is one of the biggest gay communities in the world," Val, a Russian who works in TV, explained to me. "If you are gay in Kalchuga, where do you go? Moscow!" Val had been able to marry his English expat boyfriend in a civil partnership and joked how his partner was taking on his Russian name. Sacha’s situation in the provinces was worse even than the Little Britain’s sketch “the only gay in the village”. In his provincial town, and in most outer regions of Moscow, he was likely to be beaten up for being openly gay. Until the 1980s gays in Russia were committed to hospitals for treatment by psycotropic drugs, with homosexuality only being taken off the list of mental disorders in 1999. More revellers now climbed onto the top deck as Russian pop pounded out like the thud of a paddlesteamer. The overhead metal bars became an acrobatic dance aid, as men hoisted themselves up, performed rhythmic gymnastics on their partners with a knee clamp followed by a tumbling dismount. After a few vodka and red bulls this move became less Olga Korbut than Ronnie Corbett.

Val had also noticed that we were not in the most exclusive part of the boat. An even smaller VVIP area at the bow of tables cordoned was off by a knee-high perimeter of curtain cord patrolled by three stony-faced men in black suits. Beyond them VVIPs, indistinguishable from everyone else, sat formally at their tables, not dancing. We soon discovered, like Kate Winslet in the Titanic movie, that by far the liveliest partying was to be had down in steerage. Blonde lipstick lesbians snogged with nervous giggles. A quiffed chapstick lesbian with aviator glasses pumped her arms infront of the mirrored pillar to an electro synth number. Eighties-style dancing was very much in evidence as everyone let off steam. The floor-filler of the night was a club mix of Rhianna’s Umbrella. Then as we passed the Kremlin’s walls, lit up from below, couples rushed out to photograph themselves on their mobiles kissing against the backdrop of the towering red walls.

Driving the good humour and party atmosphere was the sense of a community used to being under attack. A year before the Tatchell beating, activists had similarly been arrested and attacked by nationalists. Gay clubs had been blockaded. Moscow still boasts vibrant cruising areas near the centre in China Town (Kitay Gorod) and numerous clubs like 3 Monkeys. However many have now changed to straight clubs. In January Moscow’s Mayor Luzhkov called the gay pride march “satanic” and later in June The Russian Supreme Court upheld his decision to ban the march. So the pictures of men kissing on camera-phones were not just due to the magical, romantic background of the Kremlin, but more to stick it to the symbol of Lushkov’s authoritarian regime.

Then the atmosphere changed. The boat came in to dock at the second stopping points to find a jetty lined by paramilitary police. Rumours spread that they were not letting anyone on or off the boat. I pointed out how grim-faced the officers looked peering out from under their visors. “You would also not be smiling if you were paid the same as the soldiers in our army” someone said. A few heated exchanges with an officer ensued. A short-haired woman – who looked like Rosa Klebb out of From Russia with Love – patrolled the side of the boat, her hand on her holster. In the end the tension subsided and the boat moved on. Perhaps they were there to protect the boat from a boarding party of nationalists. It seemed unlikely. It also seemed absurd that a supposed European democracy like Russian was using its armed forces to police a peaceful cruise down the river.

Where were these troops being diverted from – guarding a missile silo, patrolling the Chinese border? The day after the cruise religious Orthodox extremists took an iron-clad ship down the Moscow river to “cleanse it of the filth”.

gayrussia.ru
http://www.gayrussia.ru/en/news/detail.php?ID=9547

August 20, 2007

11
Moscow LGBT activists protest against persecution of Iranian gays

Second year gays and lesbians rally in front of Iranian embassy in Moscow About two dozens of LGBT and political activists demonstrated in front of Iranian embassy in Moscow. They protested against execution and discrimination of gay people in Iran. The rally has been organized and supported by Russian prominent gay rights organizations like GayRussia.Ru project, LGBT Rights movement, “Free Radicals” Libertarian Movement and activists of Transnational Radical Party.

Demonstrators held slogans in support of human and gay rights. They also held rainbow flags. Slogans of the rally were: “Iran! Maintain human rights!”, “Iran! Hands off gays!”, “No death penalty!”. Last year few LGBT and political activists had also rallied on July 19 against execution of gay people in Iran. Several nazi extremists had tried to assault demonstrators. One of them had been beaten.

pinknews.co.uk
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-5356.html

4th September 2007

12
Moscow court slams gay activists

by Ian Dunt
An attempt by gay activists to protest a ban on their parade last May has met with failure as Moscow’s Tverskoy court rejected their case. The court ruled that successful attempts by the city authorities to ban the parade were legal. Event organiser and prominent gay leader Nikolai Alekseyev told Interfax the judge was challenged by plaintiffs during the hearing due to improper actions but the legal basis for the ban was nonetheless upheld. He pledged, however, to protest the court judgement with a cassation instance and through the European Court of Human Rights.

The Moscow police and city authorities are widely criticised by activists for adopting an unashamedly homophobic posture during recent attempts by the gay community to express their culture. In particular, the police are accused of standing to one side when homosexuals are attacked in the city. Blockades of gay clubs by protestors in April and May of last year led to complaints from the community that the police had failed to intervene. A gay rights forum later in the month had its accompanying march banned by the mayor.

Some activists march despite the ban and laid flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. This was met by violent protest from neo-Nazi and Orthodox groups. The BBC reported that despite beatings by protesters against the gay marchers, police managed to arrest 50 marchers and only 20 protestors. Yesterday’s court judgement refers to the attempted march organised for May this year, where renegade marchers again attempted to take to the streets despite a ban. The police again failed to protect gay activists from attack. Italian MP Marco Cappato was kicked by protestors and then detained when asking a policeman for protection. Peter Thatchell and Nikolay Alekseyev were also detained.

The Sunday Times
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2413288.ece

September 9, 2007

13
Teenage boy who gave the first lesson in gay sex

Vadim Kiselev was a young ballet fan who first spotted Nureyev throwing snowballs. “Even then I could see the beautiful catlike plasticity of his movements.” Five years older than Nureyev, with wavy blond hair and Cupid’s-bow lips, Kiselev was “an exotic” by Leningrad standards, one of a coterie of homosexual friends who, he says, were already aware of Nureyev’s true sexual orientation. “We understood that his volatility came about partly as a result of this.”

One night Kiselev invited Nureyev to his apartment. With seduction in mind, he had bought a bottle of Armenian cognac and 200 grams of caviar, which he served on bone china. But the evening did not go according to plan. His delicate sensibilities already affronted by the young Tatar’s gross table manners, Kiselev then found his advances rudely repelled. They parted “almost enemies”, and had no further contact until Nureyev turned up one day, saying: “I think I offended you.” He apologised, and while continuing to flirt with Kiselev (addressing him as “Adonis”), resumed an acquaintance free of sexual ties. He was not yet willing to consider male love as an option for himself. (Years later he told a lover in London that when he had found himself attracted to a boy on a Leningrad bus he had felt so ashamed that he got off at the next stop.)

When Nureyev met Teja Kremke, however, his attitude changed. Not only that, their relationship would lead to his defection from the Soviet Union. Teja was a 17-year-old East German boy with an erotic presence as visible as a heat haze. A student at the Vaganova ballet school, he had shiny chestnut hair, pale skin, full lips and intense grey-blue eyes. He was invited to the apartment of his teacher Alexander Pushkin, where Nureyev – already a star with the Kirov Ballet – still lived. Pushkin’s wife Xenia, who had already seduced Nureyev, was instinctively drawn to this beautiful youth. She adopted him as a new prot?g?, shaping his thoughts and tastes. Pushkin, whom Teja worshipped, soon became a father figure for him, too. A deep bond developed among all four. “It was a liaison à quatre. They were kind of bound together,” said a friend of the Pushkins.

Like Nureyev, Teja had no interest in contemporary politics but hated the constraints of communism. One evening they were talking in the Vaganova student kitchen while Ute Mitreuter, another East German, was brewing coffee.

She remembered: “Teja was telling Rudolf that he should go to the West. ‘There you’ll be the greatest dancer in the world,’ he said. ‘But if you stay here you’ll be known only to the Russians’.” “‘Yes of course I know that,’ answered Rudolf. ‘It’s how Nijinsky became a legend. And I’m going to be the next one’.” Teja confided to his sister that he and Nureyev had become blood brothers, cutting themselves to mingle their blood. But their growing intimacy was too risky to reveal to anyone at the school, even to Mitreuter, to whom Teja had always confided his sexual history in the past. “Teja talked to me about all the things he did with girls. There were many of them who were mad about him. I heard he was a very good lover and that’s why I didn’t think there was anything more than a friendship between him and Rudolf. It was only later that I knew it was a love affair.”

Teja had been only 12 when he was seduced by a 35-year-old woman, an encounter that left him with a far from conventional sexual outlook. At school he had been caught in the shower with a boy. (In the mid-Sixties he would persuade his adoring Indonesian child-wife to live in a m?nage à trois with a beautiful Aryan youth with whom he was having an affair.) “Teja was always open to new experience,” said someone who knew him at the time. “There was a perverse strain in his character. Something other people didn’t find normal was very exciting to him.” When Konstantin Russu, another student from East Germany, went to the ballet school shower room one day, he found that Nureyev and Teja had locked themselves in and were refusing to open the door. It confirmed what he had suspected for some time: often, when he came back in the evening to the room he shared with Teja, he had seen Nureyev climbing out of the window. (Nureyev would one day tell a mutual friend that it was Teja who first taught him “the art of male love”.)

At the same time, Teja was constantly goading Nureyev to leave Russia.

Teja: an erotic presence
“He’d say, ‘Go! Get out! At the first opportunity you have. Don’t stay here or no one will hear of you!’” said their friend.

Earlier in the winter of 1960 Janine Ringuet, a 20-year-old assistant impresario who worked for a Parisian organisation specialising in artistic exchanges between France and the Soviet Union, came to Leningrad for several weeks to observe the Kirov Ballet. She reported back that Nureyev, almost unknown in the West, was “the best male dancer in the world”. He was engaged for a Kirov visit to Paris. Only days before he was due to leave, Nureyev and a colleague were taken before the special committee responsible for vetting dancers for the tour. Why, the KGB officer chairing it demanded, had neither of them joined the Komsomol, the young communist organisation? “Because I’ve far more important things to do with my time than waste it on that kind of rubbish!” exclaimed Nureyev impulsively.

He got away with it but it was clear he had to leave. “In Russia,” he later told a friend, “I did not belong to myself. I had a feeling that I had a big talent which people would recognise anywhere.” It was hard for Nureyev to accept that his dream of seeing Europe was about to be realised. His defection was “prepared inside”, but he felt that he needed to gauge the reaction of his friends. During a long walk with one of them a few days before his departure, he asked: “What would you think if I stayed in the West?” The friend reminded him of the lifestyle he loved and would be leaving behind – Leningrad’s “kitchen culture’, where a gathering of friends around a table had come to mean more to him than his family. But Nureyev felt increasingly trapped at the Pushkins’ apartment. Now that Xenia could see how much of a hold Teja had on him, she had reverted to being jealous and contentious, going out of her way to cause trouble between them. But at the same time she found herself involuntarily attracted to Teja.

If Rudolf sensed the growing sexual chemistry between them he would have felt the kind of distaste and disenchantment experienced by Chinko Rafique, a student taken up by the Pushkins a decade later: “Xenia was predatory. She was sexually predatory.” Liuba Romankova, Nureyev’s close friend, has always believed that his involvement with Xenia was a key reason why he “escaped to the West”. Ninel Kurgapkina, a Kirov dancer and confidante, agrees that it was a situation from which he badly wanted to extricate himself. “He was not very proud when he talked of Xenia. He didn’t feel good thinking about her.” But even more of an incentive to leave Russia was the realisation that he would never be free to follow his true sexual instincts while he was there. As he said himself: “I did not have the possibility of choosing my friends according to my taste. It was as if someone battered me morally. I was very unhappy.”

Teja stayed in Russia. Even a decade later, Pushkin remained afraid that he would have the same malign influence on the budding new star Mikhail Baryshnikov as he had had on Nureyev. If Teja happened to drop in, Pushkin would usher the young Baryshnikov into another room, keeping him hidden until the East German had left. Baryshnikov nonetheless defected.

pinknews.co.uk
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-5563.html

26th September 2007

14
Russian activists fined over blood demonstration

by PinkNews.co.uk writer
Six gay rights protesters have been convicted of public order offences and fined by a Moscow court for protesting against Russia’s ban on gay men donating blood. Activist Alexei Davydov, who organised the picket outside the Russian Health Ministry on 14th September, was fined 1,000 roubles (£20) while five other arrested participants were each fined 500 roubles. Although all donations are screened, Russia prevents gay men from donating much needed blood as they are considered to be most at risk of sexually transmitted diseases, listing them alongside prostitutes and drug dealers. The ministry had indicated it would change its advice on blood donations from gay men, but has not taken any action so far.

Nicolas Alexeyev, one of the organisers of the protest, said: "We are going to appeal the court decisions in Tverskoi district court and in case it is necessary we are ready to take the cases of those activists up to the European Court of Human Rights." Mr Alexeyev is also the organiser of Moscow Pride and is currently contesting the ban on the 2006 march at the ECHR. Gay men are still prevented from giving blood in the UK and in other parts of Europe, despite recent campaigns by students and young people.

Portugal began accepting donations from people regardless of their sexual orientation last year and France has lifted its ban. Donations from gay men are under review in Sweden and banned in the USA, despite recent Red Cross campaigns. Mr Alexeyev is currently the focus of a criminal investigation after he outed a Russian MP on live television. The charges arise from comments he made in June, when he said politician Alexander Cheuv as a closet homosexual.

pinknews.co.uk
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-5722.html

11th October 2007

15
Russian activists lose case against Mayor of Moscow

by PinkNews.co.uk writer
A Russian judge has thrown out an appeal by Gay Pride organisers that the Mayor of Moscow Yuri Luzkhov was guilty of calling gay people "Satanic." The court decided he should not face charges of slander as his comments described the concept of a gay rights march as Satanic and not its participants. The decision was upheld from a previous district court judgment that Luzhkov did not use the term against the organisers and people who were part of the parade but rather the event itself. The Tverskoi court judge Natalya Makarova, who considered the case in the first instance, was said be one of the most homophobic judges in Russia, according to gay rights activists in the country.

In January, during his Christmas reading speech at the Kremlin, Luzkhov said: "Last year there was unprecedented pressure on Moscow in order to conduct a gay parade here, which can only be called a Satanic gathering. We did not allow this parade and will not allow in the future." He was talking about the ban on Moscow Pride events in 2006, repeated in 2007, which were held anyway amid scenes of anti-gay violence and religious and nationalist protests.

The organiser of Moscow Pride, Nicolas Alexeyev, claimed that Luzkhov’s comments were meant to insult and discriminate against gay people in general and started legal proceedings. "It is absolutely clear that the aim of Moscow mayor was not only to swear the human rights event that we wanted to conduct in May last year and this year but also to show us, as organizers of this event, in unethical and immoral light. Unfortunately, Moscow courts are fully controlled by city authorities and are not independent in their decisions."

The gay activists who defied the ban were faced with violence from protesters chanting anti-gay slogans as well as 1000 riot police who were aiming to stop the celebrations. Ken Livingstone condemned the violence, claiming the ban was "reactionary," saying: "The Mayor of Moscow should uphold the right of gays and lesbians to demonstrate peacefully." Human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell was at the 2006 parade and saw the violence first hand, commenting for PinkNews.co.uk at the time: "The Mayor’s homophobia created the atmosphere which gave a green light to the fascists to attack the Moscow Pride participants. The anti-gay violence and intimidation we experienced shows precisely why Moscow Pride is necessary. The repression of a handful of lesbian and gay protesters signifies the fear and weakness of the Russian state. We had a moral and political victory, forcing the Moscow authorities to unleash forces of repression comparable with the bad old days of the Soviet era."

Organisers of Moscow Pride had wanted Mr Luzkhov to refute his statements concerning the gay parade and pay symbolic compensation of about 1,000 roubles, the equivalent of about £20.

365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/10/102507rus.htm

October 25, 2007

16
Russia ‘Losing AIDS Battle’

by The Associated Press
Moscow – Richard Holbrooke, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told Russians on Thursday that their country is losing the battle against HIV/AIDS because of government inaction and a lack of public awareness. "You are in terrible, terrible danger here in Russia," said Holbrooke, who now heads an international group that promotes partnerships between the government and private sector to combat HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases. I’m terribly sorry to say this – this is not a political statement."

Officially, Russia had about 390,000 registered cases of HIV infection as of August 2007. But international experts say the true number of HIV carriers is closer to 1.6 million and is expected to grow by 30 percent by 2010. With 80 percent of Russia’s HIV cases among 15-30 year olds, the disease poses a threat to Russia’s economic competitiveness, according to the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

Clyde Tuggle, Coca-Cola’s president in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, said businesses are major stakeholders in the global battle against AIDS. He said his company had a "very selfish motivation" for joining the Global Business Coalition initiative in Russia. "My business is dependent on one thing: the sustainability of this community, on a successful, healthy and prosperous Russia. Without that I will have no business," he said, speaking with Holbrooke at a conference in Moscow organized by the GBC.

HIV/AIDS is spreading faster in Russia and Ukraine than anywhere else in the world, and 90 percent of HIV carriers in these countries will not know that they are infected until they get full-blown AIDS, said Holbrooke, who heads the GBC, an alliance of 220 international companies. "Over the next few years, they will be spreading it unintentionally, and on, and on, and on," he said. "It’s a bottomless pit."

Vladimir Pozner, a prominent Russian journalist who moderated Thursday’s event, said he was upset by the notable absence of Russian business leaders. "They did not come because they were not told (by the authorities) to come. Otherwise, they would have come," he said. "But partnership isn’t when the government tells business what to do."

pinknews.co.uk
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6005.html

8th November 2007

17
Ban on Pride protests upheld by Moscow court

by PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
A Russian court has dismissed an appeal from the organisers of Moscow Pride against the decision that a ban of Pride pickets as part of Moscow Pride on 27th May this year was lawful. Two pickets in support of tolerance and respect of the rights and freedoms of homosexual people in Russia were organised as an alternative to the march on the same day which was banned by Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov. One of the pickets was planned on Tverskaya Square in front of City Hall while the other was planned in Novopushkinsky Skver in downtown Moscow. Several people, among them human rights activist Peter Tatchell were attacked by homophobic protestors and many people were arrested by police.

The Prefecture of the Central Administrative Area of Moscow denied the permission for both events giving reference to Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which allows a ban on a public event for security reasons. In August the Taganski district court of Moscow ruled that the ban on the pickets by the prefecture was lawful because the authorities were unable to provide the security of their participants as the conduct of those events provoke such a strong negative reaction from the majority of the society. In their appeal to Moscow City Court sent on 10th September Pride organisers argued that Russian legislation does not allow an absolute ban of the public event and only allows to the authorities to offer an alternative place or time. This was not done by the prefecture. They asked the court to cancel the local court decision and to rule that pickets’ bans were unlawful.

Moscow Pride organiser Nicolas Alexeyev, who was in court today, told GayRussia.Ru: "The hearing lasted not more than five minutes. I saw many things in Moscow courts but I never saw such a formal hearing. The panel of three judges debated the decision for one minute though it was clear that the decision was known to them long before. Earlier these same judges already dismissed our appeals against other decisions of Moscow authorities. Now we are just waiting for the last decision on our appeal against the decision of Tverskoi district court which ruled that the march ban on 27th May was lawful. Then we will send our second application against Russia to the European Court of Human Rights."

An application to the ECHR in Strasbourg concerning last year’s Moscow Pride ban is already been before the court since January.

GayRussia.Ru

pinknews.co.uk
http://pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6199.html

30th November 2007

18
Russia’s first LGBT film festival slated for 2008

by PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
Next October the Russian city of St Petersburg will host Side by Side ("Bok o Bok"), its first international lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender film festival. The festival will run from 2nd to 5th October, 2008, with films and events at the historic Dom Kino House of Cinema, one of Europe’s premier venues for quality world cinema. The event, which is expected to draw visitors from over 30 countries as well as major international sponsors, will give film enthusiasts of all persuasions the opportunity to enjoy the very best in contemporary lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender cinema. Side by Side will also showcase work from around the world including feature films, innovative independent films, documentaries, experimental and short films.

Manny de Guerre, marketing manager for the festival, said: "We aim to provide a rich and diverse programme that will not only be of interest to the lesbian and gay community but also to the general cinema-going audience in Saint Petersburg. We are very proud to be working with Dom Kino House of Cinema and hope that Side by Side will become a permanent fixture in Russia’s cultural calendar."

Although homosexuality is no longer a punishable criminal offence in Russia, homophobia at all levels of society is rife and discrimination against minority groups goes unchallenged on a daily basis. Many people, fearing a backlash, choose not to come out and, as a consequence, must lead secret or double lives. "This is a landmark event for lesbian and gay culture in Russia," said festival organiser Irina Sergeeva, "We want to raise public awareness about lesbian and gay life and confront those very prejudices that permeate through our society. We hope that the Side by Side film festival will lead to a fruitful dialogue with the public at large, stimulating positive debate and in turn engendering greater understanding and broader acceptance of those who live a lifestyle considered ‘different’ from the preconceived norms."

The success of Side by Side will also serve as a litmus test, showing the extent to which Russia has moved towards a society where individuals are respected and human rights are valued and upheld. Side by Side is currently accepting film and video submissions to be presented during the film festival. The festival will consider works with major characters who are lesbians, gay men, bisexual, intersex and/or transgendered people.

To submit films for consideration, please visit http://www.bok-o-bok.ru/en/films/ for submission instruction.

ukgaynews.org.uk
http://ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/07/Dec/2602.htm

December 26, 2007

19
Moscow Prosecutor Officially Accuses Gay Pride Organiser in Slander Case: First ‘outing’ of Russian politician goes to court

Moscow (GayRussia.ru) – Nikolai Alekseev, the organiser of Moscow Gay Pride, will be in court soon facing charges of slander and insult following his “outing” of a former State Duma (Parliament) deputy on live national television. The Moscow prosecutors department have completed criminal investigation against the Mr. Alekseev. The investigation was started after a complaint by former State Duma deputy Alexander Chuev, who accused the Pride organiser of slander and insults. Prosecutors today confirmed the accusation against Nikolai Alekseev based on Articles 129 (slander) and 130 (insult) of Russian Criminal Code.

On June 21, Mr. Alekseev made the first ever outing of gay politician in Russia’s history. Speaking on the NTV channel’s talk show K baryeru!, he allegedly called deputy Alexander Chuev from Fair Russia party a “gay, coward and hypocrite”. Six days later, deputy Chuev sent his complaint to the General Prosecution department asking it to check if Mr. Alekseev breached articles 129, 130 and 282 of Russian Criminal Code. General Prosecution transferred the case to Moscow prosecution department which asked Moscow police to investigate it. On July 31, a criminal case against Nikolai Alekseev was officially started. Investigation was prolonged several times, with the permission of Moscow prosecution department, due to the interrogation of witnesses and the conduct of linguists. It is expected that the criminal case against Moscow pride organizer will be sent to court shortly. The court will have to give the final verdict of whether Mr. Alekseev committed any crimes under Russian legislation.

“The criminal case against me was conducted with multiple breaches of legislation and the investigators failed to find any prove of my guilt,” Mr. Alekseev said this afternoon. “Until the court hearing I have no right to disclose the details of the case and the proof that is [to be] used against me. But during the court process, many details will become known.”

Mr. Alekseev went on to suggest that “the court has no other way than to declare me innocent. Though in the current condition of pressure from authorities I can not exclude that the decision of the court will not be fair which is not anymore a surprise to us. In any case we are ready to lead this case up to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg”.

He said that he does not regret anything of what he did because “we reached the main goal of defeating Mr. Chuev in Duma elections in December” Mr. Chuev failed to get 7% of votes for his Fair Russia party in Khabarovsk region where he headed the party list. Since December 24 he is no longer a deputy of the Duma. Mr. Alekseev promised that “the court hearing will be very thrilling and exciting – we are planning to invite our witnesses whose names we did not disclose during the investigation fearing pressure from the prosecution.”

Gay Russia News & Reports 2007 June-December

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