Moscow outlaws LGBT pride parades for next 100 years

Moscow's most powerful court has ruled to uphold a ban on LGBT pride parades in the Russian capital for 100 years, according to the BBC. The ruling places a major Russian city athwart the directives of the European Court of Human Rights for a second time with regards to LGBT rights in suits brought by that country's most prominent LGBT activist, Nikolay Alexeyev.

Moscow officials insist that LGBT pride parades would pose a risk to public safety and that the majority of the the city's population are against equal rights for LGBT people. Alexeyev has successfully sued the city of St. Petersburg for arresting him under a law which banned all discussion of LGBT equality on the grounds that it constitutes "homosexual propaganda." The European Court ruled against the city and ordered Russia to pay damages to Alexeyev.

In the face of Friday's ruling, Alexeyev vowed to go back before the Court in Strasbourg to have the capital city's ban on parades branded unjust. In September, Europe's main human rights oversight agency, The Council of Europe will rule on Russia's handling of a previous LGBT rights citation.

That ruling, in October of 2010, declared that Alexeyev had been unfairly discriminated against on the basis of his sexual orientation and considered Moscow's ban on LGBT pride parades from 2006 to 2008.

A separate Russian court on Friday found three members of the all-woman punk rock collective Pussy Riot guilty of "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred" and sentenced them to two years in a corrective labor camp.

(Image via Flickr Commons)