Video: Russian gay rights campaigners pelted with eggs at International Women’s Day rally
A group of armed men were arrested in Moscow yesterday after they disrupted a gay rights demonstration for International Women’s Day by throwing eggs at the demonstrators and setting fire to their placards.
LGBT activists Igor Iasine, Nikolay Bayev, Evgeniy Pisemsky, as well as several members of the Moscow Rainbow Association and other participants held rainbow flags and placards against homophobia and sexism yesterday.
According to Grani.ru, Russian police demanded that rainbow flags should be removed from the rally shortly after the demonstration started, but allowed anti-gay protestors to continue.
Queer Russia reports that violence broke out shortly after, when a group of armed thugs attacked the LGBT campaigners with eggs and attempted to burn down their placards.
About a dozen of the assailants were detained by police, and were reported to have carried concealed knives, crowbars, and machetes.
The video of the event shows that a placard with the slogan: “No church, no kitchen, no state!” was seized by the attackers who tried to burn it.
