There are alarming reports saying that Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov wants to "eliminate" the gay community in his republic by the start of Ramadan on May 26, drawing condemnation from various human rights groups and concerned organizations and individuals. The information for the planned 'cleansing' came from the UK Foreign Office minister, Sir Alan Duncan.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum has also condemned the alleged brutal campaign of repression against gay people reported in Chechnya in recent months. The organization is calling on the Chechen and Russian governments to investigate such claims on the persecution of gay men, and is urging them to protect LGBT rights.
Sara Bloomfield, the museum's director is drawing lessons from the Holocaust experience. She said that the Holocaust teaches us what can happen when state-sponsored, group-targeted violence is not allowed to go unchecked. She added that reports about the LGBT community being targeted in Chechnya along with statements from Chechen officials seemingly endorsing violence are cause for great concern.
Sir Alan told the British Parliament that reports from human rights groups say that anti-gay campaigns and killings are orchestrated by no less than the head of the Chechen republic, Ramzan Kadyrov.
The Holocaust Memorial Museum remembered the horrific purges of gay people in Nazi Germany during the rule of Adolf Hitler. The organization said that gay men were targeted for persecution because of the view that they were carriers of a 'contagion' that weakened society and did not contribute to the growth of the ' Aryan' population. Some 100,000 people were arrested theb, half of them sent to prison and close to 15,000 were sent to concentration camps.
More than 100 men have reportedly been rounded up by authorities and detained in Chechnya in what was described as Hitler-type concentration camps on the simple suspicion that they were gay. Many were reportedly brutally beaten and tortured. At least four are alleged to have been killed, according to the investigative report of the Russian investigative newspaper Novaya Gazeta.Both Russian and Chechen authorities have denied the allegations and insisted that no persecution against gays are happening and no Hitler-type concentration camps exist. UN and U.S. officials have expressed concern on the issue and called for investigations into the matter.
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