Latvian gays and
lesbians, along with supporters from the European
Union and the United States, dodged antigay
protesters in the capital city of Riga on Saturday to
stage alternative gay pride events after an
official parade was banned. Around 50 gays and their
supporters, including Dutch European lawmaker Sophie
Int'Veld, were blockaded by an angry mob inside a
church where they had gathered for a morning service
to show solidarity with sexual minorities.
The mob chanted slogans and pelted some of the
churchgoers with human excrement when they left the
mass. Viktors Birze, leader of the Latvian national
radical organization NSS, told Agence France-Presse,
"Homosexuals are dirty sinners. They are immoral people, and
they don't have a place in normal society."
Outside a hotel, where a hastily organized
alternate event took place, more than 200 antigay
protesters gathered, mostly Russian Christian
fundamentalists and Latvian nationalists. They spat at
people as they entered the hotel and threw eggs at
them as they left.
This year's gay pride march was to have taken
place in the capital on Saturday but was banned by the
Riga city council last week, ostensibly because
of concerns over security. Last year was the first
time gay pride festivities took place in Latvia, which
joined the European Union in 2004. (Sirius OutQ
News)
