Belgrade, 02.11.2011

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) would like to inform the public that First Basic Court in Belgrade reached a first-degree guilty verdict against Dragan Marković Palma, mayor of the city of Jagodina, president of the parliamentary political party United Serbia (JS) and until recently a member of the Serbian Parliament, for severe form of discrimination of LGBT population.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) is participating in the 15th annual conference of ILGA-Europe, the biggest annual meeting of LGBT activists in Europe, which is being held this year from 27th to 30th October in Italian city Turin.

After Wednesday’s anti-violence protest Dosta je! (It’s enough!) held in front of the Serbian Government headquarters, which was organized by Gay Straight Alliance (GSA), a delegation of GSA had meetings on Thursday October 20th, 2011 with Nenad Đurđević, Head of the Directorate of Human and Minority Rights in the Ministry of Human and Minority Rights, Public Admistration and Local Self-government, and Slobodan Homen, State Secretary in the Ministry of Justice and Government’s Public Relations Coordinator.

Participants of the protest under the motto “It’s Enough!”, organised by Gay Straight Alliance in response to a recent attempted murder of a member of the LGBT population in Belgrade and the subsequent release from custody of her underaged attacker, requested from the Serbian Government to set up a national strategy against violence and discrimination and to introduce the notion of hate crime into the Serbian legal code.

Had ENOUGH of insults?
Had ENOUGH of hatred?
Had ENOUGH of violence?

Belgrade, 15.10.2011.

Regarding the statement of Minister of Interior Ivica Dačić and representatives of the Ministry about this morning’s attack on A. Ž. (24) in Belgrade city centre, where she was seriously injured, Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) would like to inform the public about several other details of the said attack.

Several thousands of citizens participated today in Novi Sad in a march entitled “Stop Fascism”, including activists of Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) from Novi Sad and Belgrade.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) strongly condemns ban on Belgrade Pride Parade 2011 and believes that this decision of the state authorities is a direct consequence of their failure to act and the fact that they have been ignoring the problem of violence and homophobia in Serbian society in the past year and in previous years also.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) is absolutely shocked at a joint press release of the extremist rightwing organization “Dveri” and the Police Syndicate of Serbia, in which they asked the representatives of LGBT organizations “to be socially responsible” and cancel the Pride Parade.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) is shocked by outbursts of hatred and open calls for violence towards LGBT people and other minority groups which were posted in the last few days on the Facebook profile of a high school teacher from Novi Sad, as was reported by some media.

The first conference on LGBT rights hosted and organized by a government of a Western Balkan country was held from 2nd to 4th September this year in Danilovgrad, Montenegro. The conference „Towards Europe – Towards Equality“ was organized by the Government of Montenegro in cooperation with the international academic conference „Justice in the Balkans: Equality for Sexual Minorities“, with the aid of the Royal Netherlands Embassy in Belgrade.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) wishes to inform the public that, after numerous postponements, today in the First Basic Court in Belgrade began the trial of Miša Vacić, one of the leaders of rightwing extremist organization „SNP Naši 1389“ (1389).

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) expresses deep concern at the past few weeks’ increase in the number of attacks or attempted attacks on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, which the public has been regularly informed about.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) strongly condemns yesterday’s statement by Dragan Marković Palma, mayor of Jagodina, that homosexuality is a disease, which was published by some media.

Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) expresses deepest concern on account of the attack on a young gay man which occurred on July 18, 2011, around 2 P.M. in Nemanjina Street, one of the central Belgrade streets.