On September 23rd, 2009 the activists of St.-Petersburg LGBT-movement met with Igor Michailov who is the St.-Petersburg ombudsman.

In early September of this year three organisations - the Russian LGBT Network, LGBT organisation “Coming Out” and film festival “Side by Side” - sent a letter to ombudsman Igor Michailov in which they informed him of the situation of the LGBT community of St. Petersburg in regards to the respect of their human rights.

The letter mentioned the police raids to St. Petersburg gay clubs, the disruption of the “Side by Side” film festival in October 2008 and of some of the movie shows in summer 2009, as well as recurring disapproval of civil actions and pickets that “Coming Out” activists planed to carry out throughout 2008 and 2009.

Meeting with Mr. Michailov was quite successful: Igor Kochetkov (Petrov), chairman of the Russian LGBT Network, told about the work of the organisation aimed at supporting LGBT activism throughout the country, and Gulia Sultanova, who represented “Coming Out” and “Side by Side” at the meeting, emphasised the educational focus of the projects of both organisations.

Igor Machailov was informed about the instances of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and emphasised that his task is to ensure that the rights of the citizens are respected in St. Petersburg. Igor Michailov said that in his opinion struggles forthe rights is a long process that takes decades, and one need to understand that for many people gender and orientation issues are very sensitive and should be treated in a delicate way. “Recently I talked with U.S. Consul and she said that some twenty years ago issues concerning gender and sexual orientation were perceived very badly. Then liberalisation process started and they ceased to have this scandalous negative connotations”.

In the end of the meeting participants decided to continue communication: An agreement of cooperation will be signed with the Russian LGBT Network, which will make possible to monitor the court practice, actions of the state bodies, regular informational exchange and other joint activities.

A round table at the ombudsman administration will be held with the organisers of the “Side by Side” film festival, where the goals, concept and the program of the festival will be presented. This meeting is designed to relieve tension and scandalous background around the festival.

The meeting with the ombudsman took place during the First International Queer Culture Festival, whose main organiser is LGBT organisation “Coming Out”. Queer-Fest took place without any prohibitions from city administration or any negative incidents. This once again shows that cultural cooperation and events centered around art and creativity can and should be carried out without governmental control or pressure.