Hungary’s LGTBQ community defies government ban to march in Budapest Pride

With high-flying rainbow flags, tens of thousands of Lgbtq The Hungarians and their supporters came down to the streets of Budapest for a pride parade, defying the government’s ban and the legal threats of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán against activists.

The organizers of the 30th edition of The Pride March in the Hungarian capital declared to expect a record participation rate of more than 35,000 people.

“This is much more, not only homosexuality, … This is the last moment to defend our rights,” said Eszter Rein Bodi, one of the walkers, in Reuters.

“None of us are free until everyone is free,” said a sign.

Orbán populist party in March accelerate a law By the Parliament which made an offense to organize or attend events which “represent or promote” homosexuality to minors under the age of 18. Orbán earlier clearly indicated that Budapest Pride was the explicit objective of the law.

The recent Hungary Law allows authorities to use facial recognition tools to identify people who attend a prohibited event. Being captured could lead to fines of up to 200,000 Hungarian toes ($ 586). The organizers risk up to a year in prison.

But Friday, the organizers of pride, as well as the mayor of Budapest, Gergely Karácsony, the European Commissioner Hadja Lahbib and the vice-president of the European Parliament Nicolae Stefanuta, said that the march will take place on Saturday despite the official threats of the heavy fines for participants and even prison terms for the liberal mayor.

“The government is still fighting against an enemy against whom he must protect the Hungarian people … This time, it is the sexual minorities who are the target,” Karácsony said at a press conference. “We believe that there should not be first and second class citizens, so we decided to stay next to this event.”

Saturday participants remained provocative.

“I am proud to be gay … And I am very afraid that the government would like to drop us. I am very surprised that there are so many people, I want to cry,” a 66 -year -old participant told AFP, who gave his first name only Zoltan.

A woman said CBS News Partner BBC She was present because she wanted a country of “diversity” for her children.

“We have a law that forbids people who are different from the others to bring together. This is why we are here. Because it harms our rights. This is why we have come,” said Luca, 34.

She told the BBC that she was worried about the future life of her 4 -year -old daughter “in a country where she cannot love anyone she wants”.

Critics of the ban on pride and other Hungarian laws targeting LGBTQ + communities say that policies recall similar restrictions against sexual minorities in Russia.

Orbán, considered the ally closest to Russian President Vladimir Putin in the European Union, has prohibited in recent years and has prohibited any LGBTQ +content, including in television, films, advertisements and literature available for minors.

His government maintains that exposure to such content negatively affects children’s development. But opponents say that movements are part of a wider effort to complete the sexual minorities and consolidate its conservative base.

Addressing State Radio on Friday, Orbán minimized the possibility of violent clashes between the police and the participants, but warned that pride “will have legal consequences”.

“Of course, the police could break such events, because they have the power to do so, but Hungary is a civilized country, a civic society. We do not injure each other,” he said.

More than 70 members of the European Parliament, as well as other officials from European countries, should participate in the March on Saturday.

Lahbib, the European commissioner, said on Friday that “all eyes are on Budapest” while the pride walkers challenge the government’s ban.

“The EU is not neutral on hatred,” she said. “We cannot remain passive. We cannot tolerate what is intolerable.”

Counter-demostracts

On Thursday, the radical right -wing part of our movement of the fatherland announced that it had asked for the approval of the police to hold assemblies in many places across the city, many of which on the same route as the march of pride.

A neonazi group said that it would also meet on Saturday at Budapest town hall, from which the pride is expected to leave. The group said only “white, Christian, heterosexual men and women” were invited to attend its demonstration.

A woman, who gave her first name only Katalin, told AFP on Saturday that she agreed with the ban even if she hoped there would be no conflicts.

“Disgusting … It has become a fashion to show us,” she said.