Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Via Andy at SiberianLight, I've learned that, for once, a Russian official seems to have found a common language with... how should I put it... someone in Latvia, the country perceived by many here as one of Russia's main enemies:

Both the Russian ambassador and the leader of the Latvian Catholics hated the gay pride parade held in Riga last month.

Here's a Moscow News piece on it:

Russian Ambassador to Latvia Viktor Kalyuzhny thanked Cardinal Janis Pujats, head of Latvia’s Roman Catholics, for the latter’s criticism of the recent gay and lesbian parade in Riga, the Baltic Times newspaper reports.

The paper quoted the Russian diplomat as saying that it would be impossible to organize such a parade in Russia, as “it is anti-human.”

He also criticized authorities’ decision to allow the march, which took place on July 23.

“Today, the mortality rate in Latvia exceeds the number of births, and now here is an attempt to say in the framework of democratic principles that this [the gay parade] is necessary and democratic,” the ambassador said. “This is not only a matter of the church, but that any normal individual should understand that cheating nature is impossible.”

Kalyuzhny told journalists that during the meeting with the Latvian archbishop he “made a deep bow to His Grace who practically alone has clearly, openly and directly said what happened here.”


Dykun, who's now in Riga, has more on the Riga gay pride and the issues surrounding it.

1 comment:

  1. Hi Neeka.

    I couldn't track down your email address, so I thought I'd get in touch via the comments.

    I just wanted to let you know that siberianlight.net has moved recently, and the http://siberianlight.typepad.com address is no more. I'd be grateful if you could update the link on your sidebar to point to our new address - www.siberianlight.net

    Thanks. Andy

    ReplyDelete