■ ’ ^ ^ '
Moscow!
Pride
Escalates
Conflict
By Rex Wockner
Contributing Writer
Yuri Luzhkov that he "will not
permit such parades," GLBT peo- Nikolai Alekseev
pie are expected to stage . ,
Moscow's first gay-pride maid) May 27.' Y;;'vert's* > .«>£.v%
In line with load requirements, organizers wiB request a permit for the
•; parade on May 15. . ^f;: $ ;;
They should receive an official response by the 17th.
If the permit is denied, organizers plan to make the final decision on
^ whether to march just three hours before the parade's planned start time, dur
ing the dosing session of a pride-week antihomophobia conference.
"Over the last days, and despite the fact that our site www.gayrussia.ru/en
was hacked and offline for 12 hours last Monday, we have received many
messages of support from inside Russia of people - gays and straights—who
| Said that initially they did not plan to come for the pride, but that after the
< recent events, they will definitely take part" said one of the organizers,
Nikolai Alekseev.
! to gays and lesbians in
The Russian medias have been quite sup
their reporting of the situation," Alekseev <
"People understand that this is a question of democracy. If the mayor of
, Moscow feels himself higher than the Constitution and bans a gay pride, then
s- tomorrow... which social group will be their target next?"
p Mayor Luzhkov has said die march would "provoke society."
"I will not permit such parades," he said in February. "My philosophy is my
g negative attitude to these phenomena, as I believe them to be unnatural to the
‘ human nature." • , : - !
Alekseev says pride oiganizers need support from abroad.
"If you want to help us, then, we hope to see you in Moscow soon," he said.
"We don’t need money in this fight We need your presence with us."
As the parade date approaches, forces opposed to file march have escalat
conttnuad on page 1»
w
m 1
i If
If iifcSt iS|i 3§! :e ~,
. -s-M.
gj
Q-Notes & Front Page Merge
QNotes publisher Jim Yarbrough and The Front Page founder and pub
lisher Jim Baxter. The combined paper begins Friday, May 19.
This issue of The Front Page — which has been serving the gay and lesbian
community in the Carolinas since 1979 —- will be the last.
Front Page will merge with Q-Notes to form a single LGBT newspaper that
serves both North and South Carolina.
The new publication will publish under the Q-Notes name and maintain
offices in Raleigh and Charlotte.
For more details, please see the May 19 issue of Q-Notes, or visit
www.q-notes.com.
AIDSWatch 2006
By Bob Roehr
Contributing Writer
'The voices of people with AIDS
must be heard. We must not allow our
society, or our country to normalize
AIDS, $aid Frank Oldham in opening
AIDSWatch 2006, the annual inunda
tion of advocates that hit Capitol Hill
on May 8-10.
The recently installed executive
director of the National Association of
People With AIDS (NAPWA) pointed
out that more than a half million
Americans, "and over 250,000 gay men
of all colors have died horn AIDS since
the beginning of this epidemic"
The number of those lobbying
Congress was down a bit from previous
years. But earlier participation had
been stimulated by numerous travel
stipends; the crew this year had all paid
their own way. They were more disci
plined, experienced, and motivated.
Oldham quoted recent criticism by
Vice President Dick Cheney of the
continued on page 17
South Carolina Pride May 13-22 Visit www.scpride.org