2005 ACTIVITIES

Project GayRussia : What have we done in 2005 ?

INTERNATIONAL DAY AGAINST HOMOPHOBIA (IDAHO)
Early in March, Louis-Georges Tin, founder of this day, gave a positive answer to the application of our organization as coordinator of the IDAHO for Russia. Project GayRussia launched its web site on May 17th,  2005 on the occasion of the first IDAHO.

Specially for this day, we have ordered and published the first public opinion poll on the attitude of Russians towards LGBT. We have also sent 14 letters - signed by 260 ordinary citizens and several Russian LGBT organizations - to all the state bodies including, President of the Russian Federation, Prime minister, Attorney General, Chairmen of both Chambers of Parliament, Ombudsman for human rights and leaders of the main political parties.

HANGINGS OF GAYS IN IRAN
In July, Project GayRussia took immediate action against barbary in Iran by sending a letter to Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, asking him to condemn the executions. A letter of protest was also sent to the Ambassador of Iran in Russia.

Project GayRussia was one of the first organization around the world to answer the appeal sent by Peter Tatchel from the London based organization "Outrage!".

At the same time, we have published an interview with the gay activists of MAHA, a local gay & lesbian magazine. Majors LGBT and non-LGBT medias have re-published this interview fully or partially. On this occasion, we received hundreds of emails of support from individuals which have been transferred to our Iranian friends.

On July 28th, Nikolai Alekseev, head of the project GayRussia and Evgeniya Debryanskaya, founder of the Russian Lesbian Movement have jointly hold a press conference in the National Information group press centre "newsinfo.ru" in Moscow to raise among Russian medias the issue of hangings of homosexual teenagers in Iran.

MEETING WITH FOREIGN PERSONALITIES
In the first weeks of its existence, our projects already met with several foreign personalities. Bertrand Delanoe, Mayor of Paris, Stephen Fry, British actor, Michael Cashman, Member of European Parliament, Jack Lang, French deputy and former minister, all accepted to give interviews to our project. They all showed unity in supporting Russian gays in their fight for rights and equality.

MOSCOW GAY PRIDE AND LGBT FESTIVAL
On July 28th, Nikolai Alekseev, announced during a press conference that the first Russian Gay Pride will be held in Moscow on May 27th, 2006 for the 13th anniversary of the decriminalization of homosexuality in the country.

Russian medias immediately expressed a major interest for the coming event. Radio "Echos of Moscow" -known as one on the last free radio channel in Russia- organized a live 1h30 prime time debate on this topic. Only  1 hour before the radio show, Jack Lang, French deputy, confirmed that he will take part in the pride, being the first foreign politician to give official support to the event. For the first time, homosexuality issues were considered by traditional medias as a neutral and even positive information.

An international contest was organized during the summer to choose the logo of the festival.

A Press Conference giving all the details of the festival was held by the Organizational committee in September in Moscow. A similar Press Conference was held on October 24th in the City Hall of Paris in front of French media.

ILGA and ILGA-EUROPE
Project GayRussia applied to ILGA during the summer. Early September, we received a confirmation of our membership. We contribute on a regular basis to the content of the Ilga-Europe "Euroletter" and its web site. 

CONFERENCES
October : Ukraine, Kiev
On October 1st and 2nd, Project GayRussia was invited by the Ukrainian Gay & Lesbian center "Nash Mir" to take part as a speaker in the "Our World - Extending the Borders " conference. During 2 days, 150 activists from 16 countries met and discussed the issues of Homophobia in Eastern Europe.

October : France, Paris
Project Gay Russia took part in Paris in the annual Ilga-Europe conference "United in diversity". We took part as speakers to the workshop "Gay Prides in Eastern Europe" and co-chair to the workshop "IDAHO : International Day Against Homophobia".

As a full member of ILGA, Project GayRussia sponsored the candidature of Maxim Lazarev to the board of Ilga-Europe. The candidate that should have initially been elected as a reserve member, due to the lack of candidatures, was finally unsuccessful because of a last minute change of the voting rules which lead to a second voting.

November : France, Lyon
On November 30th Project GayRussia was invited by the "Lyon Gay Pride", non-profit organization, to host a conference about the May 2006 LGBT festival. We gave an overview of the situation of Gays & Lesbians in Russia. The conference was hosted by one vice-mayor of the city in the Lyon City Hall, jointly with Louis-Georges Tin, President of the "IDAHO Committee"

Much achieved during our first 6 months…