According to the Russian press, Chechnya would have built camps and locked up homosexuals there.
One might think that Man learns from his most atrocious mistakes. That after the Holocaust, the notion of concentration camps would definitely be a thing of the past. But no. Its variant, labor camps, persisted throughout the 20th century, and in 2017, it was the turn of homosexuals to be mortally persecuted in dedicated structures.
Head to Chechnya. In this Constituent Republic of the Russian Federation, gays do not have the right of citizenship. The homosexual community is the object of an ignoble repression, denounced by NGOs for years. But there is worse: according to information circulating in the press, dozens of people are locked up in camps with a clear objective: the eradication of homosexuals.
Beaten to death
What the media reports Novaya Gazeta is cold in the back. According to this Russian biweekly, the Chechen authorities have set up several camps where homosexuals would be imprisoned, tortured, forced to denounce other homosexuals, forced to promise that they will leave the territory or, quite simply, beaten to death. The newspaper is based on the testimonies collected from people presenting themselves as escapees from these camps.
President Ramzan Kadyrov, placed in power by Russia, is already known for his attacks on the fundamental rights of homosexuals. Novaya Gazeta constantly denounces it and pays a high price: six journalists have been murdered since 2000.
Amnesty International in Russia said it would ask the Russian authorities to verify these allegations. But it confirms the daily persecution of homosexuals in Chechnya. “They must hide or leave the Republic. The problem is that people are afraid to testify because it puts their lives and those of other people in danger,” she said, as quoted by Courrier International.
“No homosexuals in Chechnya”
Human Rights Watch, for its part, indicates that for several weeks, a brutal campaign against the homosexual community has been taking place in Chechnya. But no one dares to say anything: the population is terrified.
Asked about the arrests of a hundred homosexuals, a spokesperson for President Kadyrov brushed aside the accusations, which he considers false… with an argument that leaves you speechless. Indeed, according to him, the existence of these camps would be absolutely impossible since there would be no homosexuals in Chechnya: if that were the case, “their parents would have already sent them to where they would never return “. “You can’t lock up and persecute people who simply don’t exist in the Republic,” he added, with a formula that says a lot about the cynicism of the Chechen leaders.
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