LGBT Human Rights Project GayRussia.Ru

The “LGBT Human Rights Projects GayRussia.Ru” (also called “Project GayRussia”) is a translational organization advocating for the rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender founded on May 17, 2005 in Moscow.

Considering that nothing has been done for LGBT people in Russia since the decriminalization of male homosexuality in 1993, a small team of activists lead by Nikolai Alekseev decided to launch a direct action group with the aim to take LGBT people out of the anonymity and gradually advance the rights of sexual minorities..

«Until we launched the Moscow Pride campaign, Russian were watching on TV the flamboyant dresses of Boris Moiseev and could only think that gays are all like him. But with all the efforts we put in this campaign, people saw something different, they saw that Russian gays and lesbians are not different than anyone else, but maybe even more advanced, ready to fight for their rights even if that means opposing to the power, the extremists and the justice. ”… Nikolai Alekseev.

There is a clear change of attitude of th Russian media towards the LGBT community before and after the launch of the Moscow Pride campaign. Daily papers such as Business oriented newspaper Kommersant initiated their first coverage of LGBT issues thanks to Moscow Pride. It marked a significant change in the attitude as in the past only tabloids used to make their headlines with LGBT issues. On television, TV shows have ben frequently organized in the issue of Moscow Pride but not only. Several highly watched TV shows also discussed the issue of same-sex family and same-sex union after 2 activists of GayRussia decided to fight for their right to family life to be recognized in Russia.

«When we launched GayRussia on May 17, 2005, not a single journalist attended our press conference in Moscow. A year later, we had a full room with over 100 journalists accredited. And this interest for our campaigns is constantly renewed every year since then by the media”… Nikolai Alekseev.

In 2008, GayRussia adopted as a slogan “Equal Rights. No Compromise!” This slogan was chosen by the group as it perfectly reflects the spirit of our campaigns: No compromise with the authorities, Equality comes first. Although members of GayRussia are regularly arrested by the police for organizing street public actions, the group works to change the legal environment for LGBT people in Russia by using the judicial systems and taking all its Court cases up to the European Court of Human Rights or the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations. We are fighting for our basic rights to be recognized the State. These basic rights such as freedom of assembly or freedom of association for examples are granted to everyone by the Russian Constitution but also by the European Convention on Human Rights from the Council of Europe and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights from the UN, both ratified by the Russian Parliament. To date, activists of GayRussia filed against Russia a total of 11 cases with the European Court of Human Rights and 2 cases with the Human Rights Committee of the UN. No other LGBT group around the world has ever been so active with these international jurisidiction.

In 2008 GayRussia expanded its work outside Russia and started a joint campaign with Belarusian LGBT activists. One of the result is the active participation of Belarusian activists to the first Slavic Pride which took place in Moscow in May 2009 but also to the Russian Prides organized in Moscow and St Petersburg in 2010 and 2011. GayRussia also co-organized and funded the largest ever International LGBT conference in Minsk in September 2009 which gathered 100 activists from all across Belarus as well as the second Slavic Pride in Minsk in May 2010 and the Equality Fstival organized the following year. International cooperation is a key element of our work. In 2009, GayRussia used contacts at the Luxemburg Parliament to obtain the official recognition of the Parliament of the International Day Against Homopbia in the national calendar.

In 2010, GayRussia united with activists in St Petersburg and became a partner and co-organizer of the first St Petersburg Pride in June of the same year. GayRussia’s lawyer Dmitri Bartnev won 3 cases in court against St Petersburg municipality which banned the Pride March. These cases are the first ever to be won in Russia on the issue of Freedom of Assembly for LGBT people. Eventually, it leaded to the organization of the first ever authorized public action for equal rights of LGBT people on November 20 in the city center. 

Over the last 5 year, GayRussia launched several campaigns which all had a wide reasonnance in the Russian and foreign media. The group uses the media interest generated around its annual Moscow Pride March to promote its advocacy work and launch every year a new campaign:

GayRussia is actively fighting homophobia and hate speeches against LGBT people. One of the most significant evidence of hate speech campaigns face by LGBT people is the speech of Oleg Betin, the Governor of Tambov Region who declared in 2008 that "homosexuals should be torn apart and their rest should be thorn in the wind" to break into pieces". Thanks to our activists who immediately launched a legal and media campaign in 2009 Governor Betin admitted that his words were "too harsh". Nevertheless, Russian Courts have refused to open a criminal case against the Governor for breaching article 282 of the Criminal Code which punish the incitation to hatred towards social groups. Activists of GayRussia filed a complaint against Russia in the European Court of Human Rights. This case could set a precedent in the notion of hate speech towards LGBT.

Our group also conducted an active campaign for freedom of expression of LGBT people. In particular, we have been struggling to attempt to cancel a law which imposes a so-called ban on "propaganda of homosexuality among minors, which since 2006 operates in the Ryazan region, - the only prohibition of this kind in Russia. Thanks to our activists the case is already before the European Court of Human Rights and the UN Human Rights Committee.

Project GayRussia operates as a non-registered organization under article 3 of the Federal Law on public association which states that: "Public organisations created by citizens can be registered in accordance with the current Federal Law and acquire the rights of registered legal body or can function without state registration and acquiring of the rights of registered legal body”.

 The organization maintains no bank account, holds no properties and does not receive any grant for its functioning or for its campaigns. All expenses and actions are self financed by the members of the group. The group believes that independence is key and that receiving grants could only have a negative impact on the work of the activists. Experience showed that LGBT groups which received funding are turned into bureaucratic organization allocating more resources to renewing grants than advocating changes in the society. Furthermore, receiving foreign grants would restrict the freedom of the organization and open the door to any pressure made by the authorities or the tax department.

Web portal www.GayRussia.Ru is the non-commrcial news portal of the organization which is run by the activists. Its aims is to inform Russian and English Speakers about gay life and gay news in Russia and elsewhere but also about GayRussia's specific campaigns. The portal was relaunched on Dcember 20, 2010 after being offline for 3 months. THe old portal will soon be back online and giv access to the database of over 10'000 articles publishd since May 17, 2005.

GayRussia is the official coordinator of the International Day Against Homophobia & Transphobia (IDAHO) in Russia. Nikolai Alekseev is a Board Member and Vice-President of the IDAHO Committee, the French NGO which is coordinating the International Day Against Homophobia, every May 17. GayRussia is also a member of InterPride and the European Pride organizers Association (EPOA).

In 2006, Nikolai Alekseev received the “Grizzly Bear” from the International Gay and Lesbian Cultural Network (IGLCN) and the “GALHA Award” from the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA). In 2008, he received the “HERO Award” from the Noble Beast Foundation and the “Citizen Award for Respecting Diversity” in San Paulo. In 2009, GayRussia received the “Golden Heart Award” from the Phnom Penh Pride Festival and the “Europahojskolen Prize” for its work for the rights of minorities from the Danish Kalø School of languages. In 2010, Nikolai Alekseev received the “A hero award” from the Vancouver Pride Society and was a Grand Marshall of Vancouver Pride.

Since 2005, GayRussia has published over 10'000 news items in Russian and English, most of them quoted by Russian and foreign media. French LGBT magazine Tetu called GayRussia activists “Les activistes les plus acharnés d'Europe”.

Our activists proved that they are fearless, unstoppable and that they will not compromise with their ideals.

To be continued...