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April 13-19, 2017 • BAY AREA REPORTER • 11
LGBT concentration camps reported in Chechnya by Heather Cassell
T
wo gay men who apparently escaped from concentrationstyle prisons in Chechnya, where hundreds of men accused of being gay have been detained, tortured, or killed, are speaking out about their experience. Last week news of mass arrests by Chechen government officials exploded in headlines around the world and human rights officials confirmed the horrifying media reports. Since then, a couple of former detainees are speaking out to human rights groups and the media. Novaya Gazeta reporters Elena Milashina and Irinia Gordiyenko, who broke the news, said that the Chechen authorities’ goal was “the complete cleansing of Chechnya from men of non-traditional sexual orientation,” either by death or being forced to leave the republic, according to UpNorth, an Englishlanguage news site serving the Nordic and Baltic Sea region. This is the first time since World War II that prison camps have been established where LGBTs have been one of the targeted communities, noted some media outlets. Chechnya is an autonomous, conservative Muslim-majority, and highly homophobic region of Russia led by Ramzan Kadyrov, who’s a former member of the Chechen independence movement and is backed by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Putin signed the so-called antihomosexuality propaganda act in 2013, which inspired copycat laws in
Google Maps
The site of an alleged gay internment camp at Argun, a former military commandant’s office in Chechnya
other former Soviet and anti-LGBT countries. Kadyrov and officials of his government denied the existence of LGBT people in Chechnya and stated gay people would be killed by their families if discovered. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told ABC News that officials were unsure “to what extent the information was true,” adding that it wasn’t the Kremlin’s role to investigate. Gay escapees from the region, who didn’t want to be identified because of safety concerns, told reporters that there are at least two secret prisons in Argun and Tsotsi-Yurt Village where gay men and drug addicts are being held. The roundup of individuals perceived to be a “problem” started in December 2016, the men told Svoboda
Ratio Station, reported Crime Russia. The Argun prison is apparently located in a former military commandant’s office, reported the media outlet. The two men said that the arrests happened in two waves; one in December and the second started in February of this year. Authorities seized the men’s phones, where they found names of other men and tortured the men for names of other men. Authorities rounded up the men in their homes, workplaces, and in online and social media stings, they said. It is unclear how many men may have actually been killed. Last week there were reports that at least three men were killed during
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