Chechyna: little news on lesbians in latest crackdown

Listening2Lesbians has been unable to find any specific information on what is happening to Chechen lesbians, except for reports which note that both lesbians and gay men have been detained. In 2017, informations on lesbians was similarly scarce, with reports emerging later that confirmed lesbians were often trapped in the private realm, suffering double oppression as women and homosexuals.

Listening2Lesbians has reached out to advocates, seeking information on the plight of lesbians in Chechnya through this escalation in anti lesbian and gay persecution.

Anyone with additional information is asked to contact us via:

• email: liz@listening2lesbians.com 
• facebook: message the page: https://www.facebook.com/LlSTEN2LESBlANS/ 
• message via twitter: https://twitter.com/listen2lesbians

2017 Listening2Lesbians articles:

• The Gay Men Who Fled Chechnya’s Purge, the Lesbians Who Saved Them and the Lesbians Who Haven’t Made it Out
• Chechnya: Reports of high domestic violence, “honor killings” of lesbians
• ‘A Lot Of Girls Would Probably Rather Die’: In Russia’s Chechnya, Lesbians Tell Of Suffocating Existence
• Lesbian endures Islamic exorcism, flees from Chechnya

2017 articles not previously shared on Listening2Lesbians:

• “If I find out that the Vainakh family has killed its daughter for misconduct, then I will stand up clapping for them” What do Chechen activists who track girls on social networks want?
• The girl escaped from Chechnya and received refugee status in Norway. In Minsk, she was stopped by the police and issued to her father

A spokesman for Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov,  told the Interfax news agency on Monday that the reports are “complete lies and don’t have an ounce of truth in them.” He insists that no LGBT people have been detained. But the Russian LGBT Network claims they have been helping the victims and on Monday said about 40 men and women have been detained since December and two have died as a result of torture. The detainees are believed to be kept in the same facility that was named in the 2017 reports.

First reports of the crackdown appeared on Friday, but activist did not release any details until Monday. “Widespread detentions, torture and killings of gay people have resumed in Chechnya,” Igor Kochetkov, program director at the Russian LGBT Network said. “Persecution of men and women suspected of being gay never stopped. It’s only that its scale has been changing.”

Continue reading at: https://sdgln.com/news/2019/01/14/chechnya-gay-purge-resumes-2-dead-40-custody-reports-say (Source)