Moscow Ban on Gay Pride Parade

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By Peter J. Smith

MOSCOW, September 5, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A Russian Court has vindicated the city of Moscow's decision to ban Gay Pride parades. On Tuesday Moscow's Tverskoi District Court rejected the protest filed by Pride organiser Nikolai Alekseev ruling that the ban enforced by Mayor Yuri Luzhkov and city authorities was legal under Russian law and justifiable over security concerns.

Aleckseev and approximately 100 other homosexual activists including Marco Cappato, an Italian member of the EU parliament, and German MEP Volker Beck, had gathered before City Hall to protest Mayor Luzhkov's ban of a Gay Pride Parade May 27. The protest turned confrontational between the demonstrators and counter-demonstrators leading to the arrests of 31 people.

This is the second consecutive year in which Mayor Luzhkov has stood up against homosexual activists and their international backers demanding Moscow permit gay pride parades.

"Last year, Moscow came under unprecedented pressure to sanction the gay parade, which can be described in no other way than as Satanic," declared Luzhkov at the 15th Christmas educational readings in the Kremlin Palace. "We did not let the parade take place then, and we are not going to allow it in the future."

Mayor Luzkov has had the univocal support of Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexis II, who praised the Muscovite mayor for his stand calling the homosexual event "a public parade of propaganda for sin." Russia's Chief Rabbi and Jewish leaders also expressed their solidarity with the Russian Patriarch in support for Mayor Luzhov.

Alekseev has promised to challenge the decision at the appeals court, although the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation has already upheld Moscow's ban on the Pride parades. In that case, Alekseev may take his case to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

See previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Moscow Gay Pride Ban Rebuked by Council of Europe
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06033003.html

Moscow Mayor Luzhkov Says "No" to Gay Pride Parade
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/may/06051904.html

Patriarch Alexis II: Homosexuality a "Vicious Deviation From God-Given Human Nature"
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06031706.html

Russian Jewish Leaders Join Orthodox in Supporting Moscow Mayor's Ban on Gay Pride
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06032705.html

Russia's Chief Rabbi: Perverse Gay Pride as Bad as Anti-Religious Cartoons
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/feb/06021706.html

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"I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by the grace of God, I will do." - Edward Everett Hale