Here's What Happened Last Year In Latvia

Timothy Jacobs, Associated Press
Saturday, July 22, 2006

RIGA, Latvia -- Anti-gay demonstrators hurled feces and eggs at gay rights activists and their supporters who were leaving a church service in the Latvian capital on Saturday.

About 20 protesters had gathered outside the Anglican church in Riga where gay activists, who had been denied a permit to stage a gay pride parade, were attending a service. A handful of the protesters lobbed eggs and emptied bags of feces on the churchgoers as they walked out the building.

"I think Latvia got a little smaller today," said Anglican Latvian-American pastor Juris Calitis, who said he, too, was struck by waste. He accused Latvian churches of stirring up anti-gay sentiment in the Baltic country.

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Church-Sponsored Homophobia in Latvia

Cardinal: homosexuality a form of prostitution
9th May 2007
Tony Grew

The opposition of the Roman Catholic church to gay Pride parades reached a new low today when the Archbishop of Riga called homosexuality "total corruption in the sexual arena" and "an unnatural form of prostitution."

An open letter from Cardinal Janis Pujats demands a referendum on the issue of same-sex marriage and calls on crowds of people to take to the streets of Riga to oppose the Pride march on June 3rd.

"If there are 1,000 sexually crazy people acting foolishly in the square of Pride, then the people’s march in Riga should have at least 40,000 or 50,000," he wrote.

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Gay and lesbian protesters were refused permission to march in Riga on the 22nd July 2006 by city officials, who cited security advice from the interior ministry.

A group of around 50 activists instead held a service of tolerance at a local Anglican church.

Hundreds of neo-Nazi skinheads, ultra-nationalists and members of the Orthodox church besieged the church, pelting the activists with excrement.

It was reported that local police stood and watched as events unfolded and declined to intervene.

The new Mayor of the Latvian capital has publicly backed the 2007 gay rights march in the city in June.

Source: http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/view.php?id=4338