Pride Organizing Committee Condemns the Violence

ZaMirZine

02 July 2008

The Organizing Committee of Zagreb Pride 2008 condemned the attacks on gay activists Kristijan Grđana and Sanja Juras and three participants who came to the Pride from Kosovo, expressing their full solidarity and support for the victims.

The Committee sees the incidents as direct attacks on freedom of opinion, expression, public gathering and political activity and demanded from the authorities to treat them as hate-crimes, not just simple misdemeanours, as initially announced.

They also demanded from the highest institutions of the state, the President, Prime Minister and the Government to immediately condemn the homophobic violence that took place during and after the pride.

-The condemnation is necessary, in accordance with European values, and has to be followed by concrete activities to suppress and eliminate homophobia, transphobia and biphobia that are overwhelmingly present in Croatian society, says the Committee.

This year`s Pride was the biggest so far, in terms of number of participants, and proceeded just as organizers expected: peacefully and with dignity, but also bravely, noisily and proudly. It received the political support by President Mesić and four Parliamentary parties: SDP, HNS, HSLS and SDSS, the strongest political support ever.

The Organizing Committee emphasized the exemplary cooperation with the Police, which did great job to secure the gathering and didn�t allow the street gangs to rule Zagreb like list year.

The event was under special attention of the European Commission, European Parliament and Council of Europe. The organizers will inform them about the event, and in particular about incidents and violent attacks and teh conduct of the Police.