The Pink Triangle Trust (PTT), a member organization of the International Humanist and Ethical Union (HEU), is protesting anti-gay legislation proposed in Russia. The legal committee of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly has introduced a draft law prohibiting the so-called propaganda of 'sodomy, lesbianism, bisexualism and transgenderism, and paedophilia to minors'.

Despite difficulties put in their way by the Russian security services, Gennady Shevelev and M. M. Bogoslovsky of IHEU member organization the Russian Humanist Society attended and spoke at a recent conference in St Petersburg organized by the Council of Europe.

Mikhail Bogoslovsky and Gennady Shevelev have issued a press release at the International Conference on "Intercultural and Interreligious Dialogue" held in St. Petersburg on 1 June 2007.

One of the more thankless tasks that the old UN Human Rights Commission set its experts was to report on specific country situations. These reports typically take years of work to prepare and are invariably torn to shreds by the countries in question and their allies while the reporters are subject to personal abuse. In this Second Session of the new Human Rights Council the existing mandate holders were asked to report. The countries in the spotlight were Somalia, Cuba, the occupied Palestinian Territories, Cambodia, Haiti, North Korea, Burundi, DR Congo, Myanmar, the Sudan and Belarus. One of these reports will suffice to give you the flavour.

See: the list of IHEU Member Organizations

See: the list of IHEU Member Organizations

When I visited Moscow

For two weeks (25 July - 8 August 2004) more than 30 students from Russia and Byelorussia attended two weeks of lectures on Humanism, Philosophical Naturalism and Critical Thinking in Moscow at an International Summer School organised by the Center for Inquiry International, Center for Inquiry Transnational, Moscow State University, State University of New York and the Faculty of Philosophy of Moscow State University.

Humanism in Russia