ČeskéNoviny.cz
Brno - At least 20 persons were hit by tear gas used by anti-gay activists about 20 minutes after the end of Czech homosexuals' march at the namesti Svobody square and the Masarykova street in Brno today.
The police and neo-Nazis clashed after the end of the homosexuals' Queer Parade, the first of its type in the Czech Republic.
The chaos lasted about 45 minutes and the tension largely subsided after 16:00.
The city police said the emergency service treated two people and one city police who collapsed and had to be hospitalised.
In adjacent streets, the police chased neo-Nazi activists. One of their groups pelted a group of about five Romanies with tomatoes.
Clashes between opponents of the gay march and homosexual activists started even before it started as the former threw crackers in the crowd. The police detained three persons.
The march did not start at the planned 14:00 and organisers were considering cancelling it for fear of clashes. The march eventually did take place, but on a shorter route.
The march lasted about 20 minutes and there was no violence. The crowd included about 500 persons with hundreds of onlookers in the city streets.
It ended at 15:00 when homosexuals released rainbow balloons at the namesti Svobody square.
by Steve Rothaus
The Miami Herald
Overall, NCAVP’s 2007 report noted an alarming 24% increase in total number of victims reporting incidents of anti-LGBT violence (from 1,954 to 2,430). The number of incidents of anti-LGBT violence rose from 1,486 in 2006 to 1,833 in 2007 (+23%), based on reporting from the exact same reporting regions as the year prior (see comparison chart of victims, offenders and incidents 2006-2007 below). In 2007, total number of offenders also increased about 5% over numbers in 2006.
Additionally, 2007 had the third highest murder rate in the past 10 years that NCAVP has been compiling the Hate Violence Report (see chart of known anti-LGBT murders in the U.S. since 1997 below) with murders more than doubling (from 10 in 2006 to 21 in 2007). LGBT people also reported a 61% increase in sexual assaults perpetrated as hate crimes. While this increase is disturbing, Jovida Ross, Executive Director of Community United Against Violence in San Francisco states: “The fact that more people within the queer community are reporting sexual assaults is a hopeful sign that they are coming out of isolation to heal from trauma. It also demonstrates the positive impact of education and outreach.”
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