Show your support for incarcerated gay men at the Russian Embassy on 12 April
London will hold a protest against Chechnya’s concentration camp for gay men tomorrow (12 April).
Held outside the Russian embassy at 5.30pm, the protest will be in response to the reports of 100 gay men detained in former military prisons.
At least three have been killed, according to LGBTI and human rights activists.
Pride In London will lead the protest at the junction of Bayswater Road and Ossington Street. Police will be there to ensure the protest’s peace and safety.
Steve Taylor, Communications Director for European Pride Organisers Association (EPOA), added: ‘More government action across the EU needs to be taken immediately to stop these atrocities.
‘We are seeing very little response to this in the mainstream media and government action so far is poor.
‘We must not be bystanders and we must challenge this inhumanity.’
Inside the concentration camp for gay men
A Chechan government spokesperson has denied there were any gay people in the region to detain. They insisted ‘you can’t detain and harass someone who doesn’t exist in the republic.’. The Kremlin also denied knowledge of a ‘purge’.
However, dozens of gay men are being held in Argun, Chechnya. It is the first concentration camp for LGBTI people since the days of the Holocaust and Fidel Castro.
Activists behind the reporting say ‘several internment camps’ have been erected in order to kill inmates or force them to promise to leave Chechnya.
One who was able to flee from the former military headquarters claimed they were forced to pay bribes to Chechen police ‘to be left alone’.
Another former inmate has said he was beaten to force them to name other members of the LGBTI community, including being electrocuted in a ‘homemade electric chair‘.
Activists on the ground are ready to evacuate people
Russian group LGBT Network said: ‘No national and/or religious traditions and norms can justify kidnapping or killing of a human being.
‘Any references to “traditions” to justify kidnappings and killings are amoral and criminal.
Adding: ‘The Russian LGBT Network is ready to evacuate people.’
