Tbilisi Pride cancelled after 1000s of hooligans attack LGBTIQ+ activists

Tbilisi Pride, the first ever Pride organisation in the Southern Caucasus, has just announced that they will cancel their Pride March planned for Today. Pro-Russian  and anti-LGBTIQ hooligan groups have been sent to the city by busses to disrupt the Pride. Thousands of anti-LGBTIQ protesters showed up. They have stormed the offices of Tbilisi Pride.  

Giorgi Tabagari, Executive Director Tbilisi Pride: “We can’t come out to streets full of oppressors supported by government, patriarchate & pro-Russian forces & risk lives of people”.

According to Hans Verhoeven, who is in Georgia to support Tbilisi Pride as Ambassador of Pride Amsterdam: “The organisers of Tbilisi Pride are in desperate need of safe spaces. They have been sheltered in the offices of several pro-democracy organisations but they constantly have to move since they are being betrayed. I call upon the embassies of EU member states to welcome the organisers of Tbilisi Pride immediately at their premises and provide them with the necessary  safety. Their lives are in danger.”

According to Rémy Bonny, executive director of Forbidden Colours, it is shameful that the EU Delegation in Georgia has failed to make a statement in support of Tbilisi Pride, despite several calls of Members of the European Parliament. “Georgian queer persons their life is under threat by anti-LGBTIQ hooligans and the EU is not even able to send out a statement asking the Georgian authorities to provide safety.”