Vladimir Putin takes pathetic potshots at the US embassy because it defiantly flew a Pride flag as Russia lurched further into the dark ages
Vladimir Putin (Sean Gallup/Getty)
Vladimir Putin has implied that employees at the US embassy in Moscow must be secretly queer because they raised the Pride flag last month.
The embassy raised the flag during Pride Month despite an order from Donald Trump forbidding embassies from doing so.
“LGBT+ rights are human rights. Human rights are universal,” the embassy wrote on Instagram last month, alongside a picture of the flag.
But Russian president Putin was not impressed with the display – and used the act of protest as an opportunity to imply that staff at the embassy are secretly queer.
Russian president Vladimir Putin claimed the Pride flag ‘reveals something’ about embassy staff.
Putin said the decision to fly the Pride flag “revealed something about the people that work there”, according to the Jerusalem Post.
“It’s no big deal though,” he continued. “We have spoken about this many times, and our position is clear.
“Yes, we passed a law banning the propaganda of homosexuality among minors. So what? Let people grow up, become adults and then decide their own destinies.”
Last month, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Kremlin staff had not noticed the flag flying at the US embassy, but said “in any event, any display of propaganda of non-traditional sexual minorities in our country is not allowed by law”.
Yes, we passed a law banning the propaganda of homosexuality among minors. So what?
Putin wasn’t the only one upset over the display of support for the LGBT+ community.
Ekaterina Lakhova, head of the Women’s Union of Russia, told Putin that children could see the flag and become “accustomed” to it.
“It would be very good to have a commission to make sure that those values that we enshrined in our constitution are upheld,” she said, according to the RIA news agency.
Putin has passed a series of constitutional amendments that will further alienate the LGBT+ community.
Putin’s comments come after a series of constitutional amendments were passed which will further rollback queer rights in the harshly anti-LGBT+ country.
The series of amendments, proposed by Putin, were backed by 78 per cent of the public, and will mean that he can remain in power until 2036.
One of the amendments will legally define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, which activists fear will stand in the way of same-sex marriage or adoption being legalised in the country.
The Kremlin has claimed the vote as a “triumph”, but concerns have been raised about alleged violations of the democratic process as well as voter coercion.
In 2013, Russia introduced its infamous “gay propaganda” law, which bans any positive depiction of LGBT+ people. Anyone found guilty of sharing such information with minors can be sentenced to heavy fines or up to 15 years in prison.
