A group of seven UN experts expressed Alarm on Wednesday over a new law aimed at suppressing LGBTQ+ voices and advocates for human and women’s rights in Belarus.
The experts feared that this repression would lead to further harassment and marginalization of LGBTQ+ people, women and other minority groups:
This law represents a dangerous escalation. It equates legitimate human rights advocacy with a misdemeanor and risks further legitimizing the persecution of already marginalized groups and defenders of their rights… By conflating human rights advocacy and information about sexual orientation, gender identity and reproductive autonomy with misdemeanors, the authorities are fueling prejudice and legitimizing discrimination.
The experts urged Belarusian officials are urged to review the bill and carefully consider any concerns raised before the law comes into force.
On April 2nd the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of Belarus approved a law that prohibits the spread of “propaganda for homosexual relationships, gender reassignment, childlessness and pedophilia.” The bill imposes fines on both natural and legal persons. Minors may also be fined or subjected to community service or administrative detention. “Propaganda” is vaguely defined in the law as the dissemination of “appealing” information intended to “influence citizens’ perceptions.”
The bill was part of a broader law introduction several administrative offenses and the adaptation of existing administrative offenses to the current industry legislation. Also Human Rights Watch said that this new bill represents another “blow” to LGBTQ+ people. The law inappropriately lumps categories such as pedophilia and gender expression together, resulting in greater stigmatization of “non-traditional” classifications of sexual behavior.
According to a recent Opinion pollIn Belarus, over 66 percent of queer people do not feel protected by the police in the event of a discriminatory attack. Additionally, only about 14 percent of people reported incidents of violence or discrimination to the police. The new Belarusian law thus corresponds to the events and atmosphere in Russia, whose Supreme Court has already done so before marked the LGBTQ+ movement as “extremist”.
