A group of LGBTQ+ Christians in Italy has said the Vatican has approved its request to make a pilgrimage during the Catholic Church’s 2025 Jubilee.

The National Catholic Register on Dec. 11 reported La Tenda di Gionata (Jonathan’s Tent) — an Italian Christian group that helps “LGBT people and their families feel welcome in their church” — asked members to “save the date” of Sept. 6, 2025, and invited “all associations and groups dedicated to supporting LGBT+ individuals and their families to join us as we officially cross the Holy Door of the Jubilee at St. Peter’s Basilica” at 3 p.m.

The National Catholic Register notes the pilgrims have also been invited to a Mass at the Jesuit Church of the Gesù that Msgr. Francesco Savino, vice president of the Italian Episcopal Conference, will celebrate.

Church Jubilees take place every 25 years.

Jubilee 2025 officially begins on Christmas Eve.

Jubilee spokesperson Agnese Palmucci confirmed to the National Catholic Register that La Tenda di Gionata’s proposed pilgrimage has been “included in the general calendar as a pilgrimage, along with all the other pilgrimages that other dioceses will make,” but noted it is “not a Jubilee event sponsored or organized by us.” 

“It is a pilgrimage organized by this association which, like the other dioceses, bodies and associations, will make the pilgrimage as they wish,” said Palmucci.

Francis DeBernardo, executive director of New Ways Ministry, a Maryland-based LGBTQ+ Catholic organization, on Dec. 10 noted he traveled to Rome in 2000, the last Jubilee year, and spoke at the first WorldPride that took place that summer.

“One of the things I remember most about that time was the anger expressed by the Vatican and the pope himself that World Pride was taking place in Rome during the Jubilee year,” wrote DeBernardo on New Ways Ministry’s website. “Perhaps particularly galling to John Paul II was that the pride event was taking place in the first week of July, which was the same week that pilgrims from the pope’s native Poland were scheduled to flood the city. And indeed, everywhere you looked you saw people with bright red neckerchiefs, a symbol of Polish heritage.”

DeBenardo noted the “mood in” Rome “was incredibly tense.”

“Vatican anti-gay rhetoric had fueled anti-gay sentiment beyond the Catholic Church, and many right-wing Italian political groups were denouncing World Pride, which was to culminate in a march from the Porta San Paolo to the Colosseum,” he wrote. “Anti-gay messages were plastered all over the city buildings. One message in particular remains strong in my memory: ‘Gay al Colosseo? Sì, con i leoni.’ (Translation: ‘Gays at the Colosseum? Yes, with lions.’)”

DeBenardo wrote the inclusion of an LGBTQ+ pilgrimage during the 2025 Jubilee “touched my heart.”

“While 2025’s event may seem like a small step, when compared with how the Vatican reacted to the presence of gay people in Rome during 2000, we can see what a sea change has taken place in terms of responding to LGBTQ+ people,” he said.

The Vatican’s tone towards LGBTQ+ and intersex issues has softened since Pope Francis assumed the papacy in 2013.

Francis publicly backs civil unions for same-sex couples, and has described laws that criminalize homosexuality as “unjust.” 

He met with two African LGBTQ activists — Clare Byarugaba of Chapter Four Uganda and Rightify Ghana Director Ebenezer Peegah — at the Vatican on Aug. 14. Sister Jeannine Gramick, one of the co-founders of New Ways Ministry, organized a meeting between Francis and a group of transgender and intersex Catholics and LGBTQ+ allies that took place at the pontiff’s official residence on Oct. 12.

Francis during a 2023 interview with an Argentine newspaper described gender ideology as “one of the most dangerous ideological colonizations” in the world because “it blurs differences and the value of men and women.” A declaration the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith released in March with Francis’s approval condemned gender-affirming surgeries and “gender theory.”

ANDORRA LA VELLA, Andorra — Andorran Prime Minister Xavier Espot Zamora has come out as gay.

“I’m gay. I’ve never hid it,” he said during an interview with Radio and Television of Andorra, the country’s public broadcaster, on Monday. “Now, if I’m not asked I don’t have to say it, in the sense that it doesn’t define the entirety of who I am and even less my personal politics, but at the same time I think it shouldn’t be a problem to express it. And if this helps many children, young people or teenagers who are going through a difficult time see that in the end, regardless of their condition or sexual orientation, you can prosper in this country and reach the highest magistracy, then I am happy to express it.”

Andorra is a small country known for its ski areas that is nestled between Spain and France in the Pyrenees.

Espot has been prime minister since 2019. The country’s lawmakers in 2022 extended marriage rights to same-sex couples.

The prime minister is one of a handful of heads of state and government who are openly gay or lesbian.

Latvian President Edgars Rinkēvičs took office in July.

Luxembourgish Prime Minister Xavier Bettel has been in office since 2013, while Ana Brnabić became Serbia’s prime minister in 2017. Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar is openly gay.

Deputy Belgian Prime Minister Petra De Sutter is a transgender woman.

Then-Icelandic Prime Minister Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir in 2009 became the world’s first openly LGBTQ+ head of government.

LEUSDEN, Utrecht, the Netherlands – In a historic first for the beauty pageant where the finalist will go on to compete in the Miss Universe pageant, the title and tiara of Miss Netherlands was awarded to a 22-year-old transgender woman on Saturday, July 8 at the AFAS Theater in Leusden.

Rikkie Valerie Kollé was selected as Miss Netherlands and will represent her country at the 72nd Miss Universe pageant set to take place in El Salvador later this year. Kollé, a Dutch-Moluccan model and actress living in Breda succeeds her predecessor, Ona Moody.

In a press release, pageant officials noted that Nathalie Mogbelzada, 26, from Amsterdam, was named first runner-up while Habiba Mostafa and Lou Dirchs were awarded Miss Congeniality and Miss Social Media, respectively.

Reigning Miss Universe R’Bonney Gabriel from the United States attended the glittering event as a special guest.

Kollé will be the second transgender representative at the Miss Universe pageant after Spain’s Angela Ponce who participated in 2018.

NPR reported the 71-year-old competition first began allowing transgender contestants in 2012.

More trans women have been competing in the preliminary pageants in recent years. In 2021, former Miss Nevada Kataluna Enriquez became the first trans contestant in a Miss USA pageant. Trans woman and activist Daniela Arroyo González will compete for this year’s Miss Universe Puerto Rico title next month.

Thai business mogul Anne Jakrajutatip, a trans activist who is also transgender, bought the Miss Universe Organization last year. She has said she’s committed to advancing the organization as an inclusive platform and wants to transform the brand for the next generation.

NPR also noted that Kollé has another chance to make history: If she takes the Miss Universe title in December, she would be the first out trans woman to do so.

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ISTANBUL — Turkish police on Sunday detained dozens of people after they participated in an Istanbul Pride march.

Reuters reported police in riot gear blocked access to the city’s Istiklal Avenue and Taksim Square and limited access to public transportation in the area.

The news agency noted police detained at least 50 people. An activist with whom the Washington Blade spoke on Sunday said police took 60 “of our friends … into custody.”

“Two of the people the police unlawfully took from the streets to take statements are under the age of 18,” said the activist.

Turkish authorities over the last decade have cracked down on LGBTQ+ and intersex activists in the country.

Police in 2015 used tear gas and water cannons against people who were about to participate in an Istanbul Pride march. Authorities in 2017 arrested nearly two dozen people who defied a ban on Pride events in the city.

Police in Ankara, the Turkish capital, on May 10, 2019, arrested 18 students and an academic who participated in a Pride march at the Middle East Technical University. They faced up to three years in prison, but a court in 2021 acquitted them. Police in 2022 violently broke up a Pride parade at the same Ankara university.

The State Department in 2021 criticized Turkey after police once again used tear gas to disperse Istanbul Pride march participants. Security forces last June arrested more than 370 people who tried to participate in another Istanbul Pride march.  

The activist with whom the Blade spoke noted police in Izmir, the country’s third largest city, on Sunday detained at least 10 people who participated in a Pride march. 

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, a former Istanbul mayor who has governed Turkey since 2003, won re-election on May 28. The activist and others across the country say they expect Erdoğan will further restrict on LGBTQ+ and intersex rights.

REYKJAVÍK, Iceland — Lawmakers in Iceland on June 9 approved a bill that will ban so-called conversion therapy in the country.

Media reports note 53 members of the Icelandic Parliament voted for the measure, while three MPs abstained. Hanna Katrín Friðriksson, an MP who is a member of the Liberal Reform Party, introduced the bill.

“This is a really important issue for all gay people and a step worth celebrating,” said Samtökin ’78, an Icelandic LGBTQ+ and intersex rights group, after the vote. “There is no cure for being gay and any attempt to do so is violence. It’s so good that the government recognizes it with legislation.”

Malta, Cyprus, Brazil and Ecuador are among the other countries that ban conversion therapy.

BRUSSELS, Belgium – ILGA-Europe announced a new two part 12-month program focused on the work being done by and for racialized LGBTQ+ communities across Europe this week.

According to the international LGBTQ+ advocacy non-profit, the new initiative will be supporting up to 15 organizations’ work on socio-economic justice for racialized LGBTQ+ communities through a combination of grants and other resources.

The program has two interconnected components:

• Financial support for the implementation of a project (up to 20.000 euro per project), AND
• Learning and networking that will bring grantees together (on-line) on a regular basis to exchange learning, share challenges and solutions, build solidarity and find points for collaboration and inspiration.

The aim of this program is to:

• Bring together a group of up to 15 European LGBTI organizations/groups across Europe that work on addressing the intersectional impact of socio-economic injustice, racialization, racism and supremacy and specific harms affecting the lives of racialized LGBTI communities across Europe.
• Support, strengthen and advance their work on socio-economic justice for racialized LGBTI communities through a combination of grants and regular peer-learning/networking meetings.

ILGA-Europe noted that currently, the LGBTI movement across Europe operates in an increasingly hostile environment that directly affects the lives of LGBTI communities and the work of activists.

This environment is marked by anti-rights opposition, anti-democratic developments, rising unemployment, economic crises, ongoing and brewing geo-political conflicts, deepening structural inequalities, fear-mongering, mounting transphobic, and sexist and racist rhetoric and violence.

In a statement, ILGA-Europe said:

“So many organizations and groups have been doing incredible work and contributing to change, while at the same time being historically excluded from funding. By supporting these groups, we also wish to recognise and acknowledge the specialized knowledge and skills involved in addressing intersectionality. This can mean anything from exposing structural oppressions that shape harm; building and sustaining the resilience of racialized communities; developing and applying anti-racist, feminist and alternative approaches; to working through – and in spite of – institutional violence and trauma.

This programme expresses our commitment to continue our engagement with socio-economic justice and to strengthen our work on anti-racism. We see a great value for the wider movement in making the work of the organizations supported, disseminated and visible. We see an opportunity to bring the learning from this programme to the wider movement, as we believe that solutions and approaches that include a few will pave the way and point to the solutions for many.”

Key information & details:

In selecting proposals, ILGA-Europe will prioritise projects that:

• Demonstrate clear understanding of how the intersection of LGBTI identities, socio-economic injustice and racialisation works in their local contexts
• Present a clear plan for how the envisaged change is going to come about in these contexts
• Seek to establish practices/tools/solutions that can live beyond the project’s lifetime
• Have the potential to enhance the movement’s thinking on anti-racism and working towards socio-economic justice in general and for socio-economic justice for racialised LGBTI communities in particular.
• Respond to the framework, aim, objectives, and areas of work of this call
• Are implemented by LGBTI-run organisations and initiative groups in Europe that have history and practice of working with and for racialised LGBTI communities

Deadline & Timeline:

• Proposals should be submitted using the attached application form and budget template. The last day to submit your application (deadline) is 2 April 2023, Sunday, 23:59 CEST.
• We will review applications, decide on projects to be supported and inform all applicants about the results of the review via the e-mail address provided in the application by 5 May 2023.

• Contracts will be signed with organisations in May 2023. Successful applicants should be available to respond to requests during that period. The project must start on 1 June 2023.
• To submit an application or if you have any questions in the preparation of your project proposal, please contact: [email protected]

Questions?

If you have any questions in the preparation of your project proposal please submit them via e-mail to [email protected]

We will answer all of your questions via e-mail and then publish answers on a dedicated ilga-europe.org website page on 27 February and on 23 March, in order to share the information among all applicants.

Call for Applications DOWNLOAD

Application Form DOWNLOAD

Budget Template DOWNLOAD

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia – A proposal that would have codified the ability of same-sex couples in Slovakia to register their partnership, which would have granted inheritance rights, decisions regarding medical care, treatments and compensation in the event of death or injury at work, was rejected by the Slovakian Parliament this past week.

The legislation did not give equal protections and rights such as marriage or civil unions and needed 76 votes to be passed. The bill saw 50 parliamentarians vote in favour, 37 politicians vote against, 15 submitted a blank vote, and 31 did not vote at all.

Slovakian President Zuzana Čaputová was critical of the outcome telling various media outlets the legislation was necessary to protect the “safety and acceptance of [our] fellow-citizens.” “We need to act,” she tweeted. “Our society is not threatened by the love of two people of the same sex or their partnership.”

The vote on the legislation occurred a few days after a vigil was held in the Slovakian capital city to honor the two victims killed and a third who was badly wounded in a shooting outside of the Tepláreň bar, a popular LGBTQ+ establishment in the old city, which was also attended by the nation’s president and the European Parliament’s Vice-President.

President Čaputová noted regarding the vote, “Our society is paying for indifference and insensitivity when even such a tragedy does not move a sufficient number of deputies to take the necessary and correct step.”

Opposition to granting rights to same-sex couples as well as opposition to LGBTQ equity in rights in the country is led by the far-right political groups including the Kresťanská únia (Christian Union).  Richard Vašečka, a party Member of Parliament told the Standard  his party promised before the last elections to protect marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

He added he is afraid that this law is only the start of an “avalanche” that ends with allowing the adoption of children by same-sex couples and punishing people for disagreeing with the LGBTQ agenda.

Vašečka stressed that he respects every person but is convinced that “every child deserves a father and a mother, and it is the best family space for raising children.”

MÜNSTER, Germany — A Transgender man who was attacked at a Pride event in Germany last weekend has died.

Deutsche Welle reported Malte C. on Aug. 27 was defending two women at a Pride event in Münster, a city in western Germany, from a man who was harassing them. The man then began to punch Malte C. Deutsche Welle reported Malte C. fell to the ground and lost consciousness.

Trans*-Inter*-Münster, a local advocacy group who said Malte C. was one of its members, in a Facebook post said he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and had been in a coma at a hospital. 

Malte C. died on Friday.

Deutsche Welle reported police have detained the man suspected of attacking Malte C.

“We are shocked and saddened,” said Trans*-Inter*Münster in its Facebook post. 

The Lesbian and Gay Association in Germany (Lesben- und Schwulenverbandes in Deutschland in German) also condemned the murder.

“This misanthropic attack is an anti-queer hate crime that makes us angry and saddened,” said Andre Lehmann, a member of the Lesbian and Gay Association in Germany’s national board of directors, in a statement. “We call on the investigating authorities to immediately name and classify this act as an anti-LGBTI hate crime.”

“The attack was not triggered by the young man’s efforts to mediate, as stated in a joint press release by the Münster police and public prosecutor’s office today, but by the deeply inhumane attitude of the perpetrator,” added Lehmann. “This act shows once again how much we need action plans against transphobia and homophobia.”

Sven Lehmann, the German government’s queer commissioner, is among those who also expressed outrage over Malte C’s murder.

“Malte died after a hate attack at CSD (Christopher Street Day) Münster. I am stunned and sad ,” tweeted Sven Lehmann. “My condolences and deepest sympathies go out to his family and friends. Violence against queer people is a threat we all need to confront.”

Nach einer Hassattacke beim CSD Münster ist #Malte verstorben. Ich bin fassungslos + traurig. Mein Beileid + tiefes Mitgefühl gilt seinen Angehörigen + Freund*innen. Gewalt gegen queere Menschen ist eine Bedrohung, der wir alle uns entgegen stellen müssen.https://t.co/J5JEWYAelQ

— Sven Lehmann (er/he) (@svenlehmann) September 2, 2022

BERLIN — The cultural attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Germany has applauded the German government’s efforts to welcome Ukrainians who have sought refuge in the country.

“The German government and the municipalities and the 16 states have been extremely welcoming of Ukrainian refugees in Germany,” Cherrie Daniels told the Washington Blade on July 22 during a virtual interview from the embassy in Berlin.

More than 900,000 Ukrainians have arrived in Germany since the war began on Feb. 24.

Ukrainians are able to enter Germany without a visa. 

The German government provides those who have registered for residency a “basic income” that helps them pay for housing and other basic needs that include food. Ukrainian refugees can also receive access to German language classes, job training programs and childcare.

Dmitry Shapoval, a 24-year-old gay man from Ukraine who lives with HIV, is among the LGBTQ and intersex Ukrainians who have found refuge in Berlin. The Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Refuge has partnered with Airbnb.org and Alight (formerly known as the American Refugee Committee), to provide short-term and more permanent housing to Shapoval and other LGBTQ+ and intersex Ukrainians and other displaced people in Germany and other countries in Europe.

Ukrainians, Russians, Iranians, Syrians, Algerians, Ghanaians and people from more than a dozen other countries attended a roundtable on LGBTQ+ and intersex refugees the embassy co-hosted with the Canadian Embassy in Germany on July 19. ORAM Executive Director Steve Roth and representatives of Germany’s Lesbian and Gay Association, Queer Refugees Deutschland, Human Rights Watch, Quarteera and Miles also participated. 

“We can and must promote the protection of vulnerable LGBTQI+ refugees and asylum seekers,” said U.S. Ambassador to Germany Amy Gutmann. “These people are the most vulnerable of the vulnerable and we can and we must respond to human rights abuses. And we can and we must engage international organizations on the human rights of LGBTQI+ persons.”

Daniels said one of the issues roundtable participants discussed was “making sure that asylees get appropriate legal counseling before their asylum hearing.”

“Every country, including the United States and Germany, could do better,” she told the Blade.

Daniels added the roundtable’s overall goal was “to listen to what (participants’) challenges are in the countries they come from.”

“Our job is to listen to what those challenges are and see what our embassies in those regions or what the State Department at-large in the White House can do to support their additional inclusion and equal rights for them,” she said.

Daniels spoke with the Blade a day before Berlin’s annual Christopher Street Day parade took place.

The embassy, which is adjacent to Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate. was flying several Progress Pride flags in the days leading up to the parade. The canopy over the embassy’s main entrance was also adorned in rainbow colors.

The embassy — along with the U.S. Consulates in Frankfurt, Düsseldorf, Leipzig, Hamburg and Munich — on July 6 hosted a discussion about LGBTQ+ and intersex issues in sports. Former Washington Spirit player Joanna Lohman, Portland Thorns coach Nadine Angerer and former German soccer player Marcus Urban participated.

Lohman is a lesbian, while Angerer and Urban are openly bisexual and gay respectively.

The embassy has also launched “UnterFreunden,” a podcast with an episode that highlights LGBTQ+ and intersex issues.

“What we wanted to assure is that we don’t only celebrate Pride during Pride Month, in June or July in Germany,” Jesse George, the embassy’s public diplomacy and media advisor, told the Blade during the interview with Daniels. “So we are amplifying and doing outreach regarding the LGBTQI+ community all year long.”

President Joe Biden in February 2021 signed a memo that committed the U.S. to promoting LGBTQ+ and intersex rights abroad as part of his administration’s overall foreign policy. The White House in the same year named Jessica Stern, who was previously the executive director of OutRight Action International, as the next special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights abroad.

The State Department in April began to issue passports with “X” gender markers. Stern during an exclusive interview with the Blade ahead of Pride Month noted the Biden administration’s continued support of LGBTQ+ and intersex rights abroad also includes marriage equality in counties where activists say it is possible through legislative or judicial processes.

“When together we stand up for LGBTQI+ persons, we stand up for the work of building a country and a world where everyone belongs and everyone’s rights are respected, no matter who they are or who they love,” said Gutmann during the July 19 reception.

The U.S. Supreme Court on June 24 struck down Roe v. Wade. 

Justice Clarence Thomas in his concurrent opinion said the Supreme Court should reconsider the decisions in the Obergefell and Lawrence cases that extended marriage equality to same-sex couples and the right to private, consensual sex. 

The Respect for Marriage Act, which would codify marriage equality into federal law, passed in the U.S. House of Representatives last month with 47 Republicans voting in favor of it. The bill needs 60 votes in the U.S. Senate to overcome a potential filibuster.

Daniels said the Roe ruling is “definitely” on the minds of LGBTQ+ and intersex activists in Germany and “on our mind.”

“What we can do as an administration is to stand in solidarity with those marginalized communities and, of course, for women’s and girls’ rights and for reproductive rights globally,” she said. “That is something we can do as a State Department, as a foreign policy agency.”

Richard Grenell represented U.S. in Berlin from 2018-2020

Former U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, who is openly gay, represented the U.S. in Berlin from 2018-2020.

The previous administration tapped Grenell to lead an initiative that encourages countries to decriminalize consensual same-sex sexual relations. The Blade last August filed a lawsuit against the State Department in federal court in D.C. that seeks Grenell’s emails about the initiative.

The embassy during Grenell’s ambassadorship hosted a group of LGBTQ+ and intersex rights activists from around the world. Grenell and then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Kelly Knight Craft in 2019 organized an event on the sidelines of a U.N. Security Council meeting that focused on decriminalization efforts around the world.

Grenell, among other things, faced condemnation from politicians in Germany who accused him of supporting far-right politicians and attempting to interfere in German politics. Advocacy groups in the U.S. and around the world also sharply criticized Grenell over his outspoken support of then-President Donald Trump.

Daniels did not specifically discuss Grenell during the interview. Daniels said in reference to the embassy’s work in support of LGBTQ and intersex rights that “people had been invited to the embassy in that period for certain public events.”

“Now having our doors wide open and showing this inclusive face of the United States, you know, I’ll let other people draw that contrast,” she said.

“In these four walls so to speak, we’re hearing, we’re listening and steering to the extent we can, sharing our policies and programs in a way that will address how can we improve that message of inclusion and of equal rights as LGBTQ rights or human rights,” added Daniels. “It’s not some niche issue. It’s mainstreamed into all of our policies.” 

Daniels further stressed “that’s a difference that you’re going to see.”

“Again, it’s not flying the flag on Pride Month, although that’s wonderful,” she said. “It’s fighting for those rights, and all of our programs and all of our outreach and ensuring that that’s human rights. It’s not something that’s just for a particular, you know, trying to show that we do it. I think people can feel that inclusion when they’re in the company of this embassy.” 

BERLIN — Dmitry Shapoval is a 24-year-old gay man from Ukraine who lives with HIV.

He was working at an IT company’s call center and studying web and UX design in Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, in February when Russia launched its war against his country. Shapoval swam across a river and entered Poland less than a month later.

Shapoval now lives in Berlin with his cat Peach and has begun the process of resettling in Germany.

“I feel very secure here,” Shapoval told the Washington Blade on July 22 during an interview at Berlin’s Palais Populaire by Deutsche Bank on the city’s Unter den Linden boulevard.

Shapoval is one of the more than 900,000 Ukrainians who have arrived in Germany since the war began. 

Ukrainians are able to enter Germany without a visa, and the German government provides those who have registered for residency a “basic income” that helps them pay for housing and other basic needs that include food. Ukrainian refugees can also receive access to German language classes, job training programs, and childcare. 

Anastasiia Baraniuk and her partner, Yulia Mulyukina, were living together in Dnipro, a city on the Dnieper River in central Ukraine, when the war began. 

Mulyukina, who is from Russia, was living in Moscow when she and Baraniuk began to talk online. Mulyukina traveled to Lviv in western Ukraine via Istanbul to meet Baraniuk, who is a Ukrainian citizen.

Mulyukina on July 22 told the Blade at Palais Populaire that she asked the Russian Embassy in Kyiv for help when the war began. Mulyukina said officials suggested that she “ask Ukraine what to do.”

“I was really shocked that my own country, with this idea of bringing peace, bringing quiet to Ukraine, just rejected me entirely,” she said in Russian as Shapoval translated.

Baraniuk, who also spoke with the Blade in Russian, said the Ukrainian government and a local NGO provided them with food and money. 

The couple had planned to stay in Ukraine, but they decided to leave after Mulyukina “heard five explosions” while she was walking to a store. The two women’s friends gave them money to buy train tickets to Poland.

Insight, a Ukrainian LGBTQ and intersex rights organization, helped Baraniuk and Mulyukina and their cat enter Poland. They spent a week there before they arrived in Berlin on April 28.

Shapoval met them when they arrived at the train station.

Shapoval, Baraniuk and Mulyukina are among those who attended a reception that took place at the end of a two-day meeting the Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration organized that took place in Berlin from July 21-22.

Activists from Ukraine, Germany, Poland, Romania, Moldova, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Italy and the U.S. attended the gathering that had a stated goal of starting “the conversation about long-term/mid-term needs and solutions for LGBTIQ Ukrainians and incite collaboration among stakeholders working with LGBTIQ Ukrainians and third-country nationals.” 

“We were thrilled to bring together activists and human rights defenders from 10 countries and 20 organizations to develop medium and long-term strategies to support displaced LGBTIQ Ukrainians and third country nationals,” ORAM Executive Director Steve Roth told the Blade after the meeting. “All these organizations, including ORAM, have done an amazing job getting emergency support and services to LGBTIQ Ukrainians in need. As the war in Ukraine drags on, it’s more important than ever for organizations to coordinate efforts and plan for supporting longer term needs. This two-day roundtable in Berlin was a great step in that direction.”

ORAM has partnered with Airbnb.org and Alight (formerly known as the American Refugee Committee) to provide more than 1,000 nights of short-term housing to LGBTQ and intersex Ukrainians and other displaced people in Germany and other countries in Europe. Shapoval, Baraniuk and Mulyukina are among those who live in such apartments.

Roth noted ORAM has begun to develop “a housing collective” for LGBTQ and intersex Ukrainians in Berlin. He said ORAM rents the apartments in which the refugees can live for up to six months, “allowing them to register in Berlin, access social welfare and other services.” 

“Safe and secure housing is one of the most urgent needs facing displaced LGBTIQ Ukrainians,” Roth told the Blade. “It’s an essential element in getting settled and rebuilding lives.”

Berlin Pride shows solidarity with Ukraine

The meeting ended a day before the annual Christopher Street Day parade took place in Berlin.

Baraniuk helped carry ORAM’s banner during the parade, while Mulyukina took pictures for the organization.

‘Stop Russian aggression’

Kyiv Pride Executive Director Lenny Emson is one of the LGBTQ and intersex activists from Ukraine who participated in the ORAM meeting and in the parade.

He told the Blade before the parade began that he took several trains from Kyiv to Poland before he flew to Berlin. Emson said the trip took two days.

“I understand that it is a safe ground, but I still have those flashbacks,” Emson told the Blade as he smoked a cigarette in front of a hotel near the parade staging area. “When you were sitting in the conference room and I saw something that reminds me of an air raid siren I was getting a panic attack. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a safe place.” 

Emson also took issue with parade organizers’ opposition to war.

“Unfortunately, we as the Ukrainian community here (are) very disappointed with the motto that Berlin Pride put on the main stage: No war,” said Emson. “This doesn’t reflect the feelings that we have right now.”

“We would like to actually say it loud: Stop Russian aggression,” he added. “We need action right now. We need to stop it. We need to stop Russian aggression. We need to stop it right now.”

A group of marchers held a blue and yellow — the colors of Ukraine’s flag — banner that read “Arm Ukraine: Make Pride in Mariupol possible” while others simply carried the Ukrainian flag.

A man carried a homemade sign that read “Arm Ukraine: Make Pride in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odesa, Zaporizha, Kryvyi Rih possible again.” Viktoriya, a woman from northern Ukraine who is now pursuing her Ph.D. in Berlin, held a cardboard poster that noted her homeland’s “queer soldiers are fighting for all of us.”

“I’m marching for both rights of queer people and rights of Ukrainians: The right to live and the right for love,” she said as she marched toward Potsdamer Platz in the center of Berlin.

Discrimination and violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity were commonplace in Ukraine before the war.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last year pledged his country would continue to fight anti-LGBTQ and anti-intersex discrimination after he met with President Joe Biden at the White House. 

Shapoval, who is dating a man he met last October when he traveled to Berlin, told the Blade that he received “looks” in Kyiv if he wore a pink shirt.

He was wearing a pair of purple sneakers during the interview. Shapoval said he would not have been comfortable wearing them if he were still in Kyiv.

“For me it was even harder because I had misery in Ukraine because of homophobes,” he said. “Even the gay community is so toxic in Ukraine because it’s all about toxic masculinity and all of that … I also had some experiences where gays were like, ‘Oh my gosh just cut your hair and then we will get in touch with you.’”

Shapoval has begun the process of applying for German residency. 

“I fell in love with the city right from the beginning,” he said. “I found friends here.”

Jessica Stern, the special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights, and others have noted transgender and gender non-conforming Ukrainians have not been able to leave the country because they cannot exempt themselves from military conscription. Another issue that LGBTQ and intersex Ukrainians have faced as they attempt to resettle in another country is the lack of legal recognition of their relationships.

A marriage equality petition that Kyiv Pride submitted to Zelenskky on July 12 received more than 28,000 signatures, which is higher than the threshold that requires him to consider it. Ukrainian law requires Zelenskky to respond to it within 10 days of receiving it. 

Baraniuk and Mulyukina hope to resettle in the U.S. and Canada, but are unable to legally prove they are in a relationship. The U.S. has a marriage-based immigration system for bi-national couples, while the Canadian system requires them to be married or “common-law partners.”

The U.S. has approved Baraniuk’s resettlement request, but denied Mulyukina. 

They said the process to legally prove they are together is prohibitively expensive.”Right now we are looking for a way to get the proof that we are a couple,” said Baraniuk. “We don’t want to stay in Berlin.”