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Russia bans another gay website, one dedicated to HIV education

Written by gaytourism

Russia has blocked another gay website. | Photo: Parni PLUS

Russian censors have blocked another gay website, this time one that is a portal for LGBTI health and HIV information.

Parni PLUS (Guys Plus) announced it had received the notice from the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media known as Roskomnadzor.

It said a local court ruled that the website ‘contains information challenges family values ​​that promote unconventional sexual relations’.

The Burlinsky District Court in the outlying Altai Territory, which borders Mongolia and Kazakhstan, made the ruling on 26 January, 2018.

But Parni Plus was only notified of that decision on 28 April. That left it no time to appeal the decision.

The court ruled Parni PLUS’ content violated Russia’s infamous 2013 ‘gay propaganda’ law.

In its notice to the website Roskomnadzor said it had 24 hours to remove the prohibited content from the website or restrict access to it.

But the order does not say exactly which content broke the law.

‘Parni PLUS has hired lawyers to appeal the ruling,’ the website said in a statement.

‘Our resource has existed for more than 10 years and consistently informs people about the HIV situation in Russia, gay health issues and other events of the LGBT world.’

Gay website blocking is a ‘trend’

Parni PLUS said the order to censor its website was part of an obvious ‘trend’.

At the end of March this year, Roskomnadzor also blocked gay.ru, Russia’s longest running LGBTI website.

President Vladimir Putin’s controversial ‘gay propaganda’ law has led to the blocking of many LGBTI-friendly sites.

Well-known activist, Evdokia Romanova, was charged under the law after she shared pro-LGBTI news articles to her Facebook account.

Last year, the European Court of Human Rights ruled agains the law. Nearly every judge in the ruling said Putin’s law was ‘discriminatory, reinforced stigma and prejudice and encouraged homophobia.’

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