Jun. 4, 2013 (TSR) – The secretary-general of the Council of Europe, Thorbjørn Jagland, demanded that Russia, as a signatory, must allow LGBT rallies and that it should protect the rights of citizens wishing to hold public rallies, Reuters reported.
Over recent months, as support for same-sex marriage increases in the West, there has been an increase in violence against Russian LGBT people, a crack down on some gay pride marches, and laws are being considered to make gay “propaganda” illegal around minors which has become an increasingly divisive issue since Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency.
Activists and rights groups say the loose wording of the law could be used to clamp down on demonstrations by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people such as gay pride parades. Already in Moscow, courts enacted a hundred-year ban on gay pride paradesin June 2012.
“Authorities have an obligation also to (ensure) that LGBT people can express their views and (hold) demonstrations,” said Thorbjorn Jagland, a Norwegian politician for the Labour Party and also the Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee (since 2009), responsible for awarding the Nobel Peace Prize.
“This is a fundamental principle in the European Convention on Human Rights,” he said.
Thorbjørn Jagland is a Norwegian politician for the Labour Party, currently serving as the Secretary General of the Council of Europe (since 2009). He is also the Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee (since 2009), and as such responsible for awarding the Nobel Peace Prize.
An aggressive crowd shouted insults and threw smoke bombs over police barriers to break up a gay rally last month in St. Petersburg, forcing activists to escape in minibuses only minutes after the start of the demonstration.
Moscow authorities also rejected two requests this week by LGBT activists to hold rallies, agencies reported, though activists say they will carry out a demonstration in a central Moscow park on Saturday regardless of the city’s decision to ban it.
Yet last year, St Petersburg authorities permitted a rally against homophobia, but its participants were attacked by masked thugs, none of whom were arrested.
A law in the city of St Petersburg law equates homosexuality with paedophilia and was passed by the city on February 29 of last year – despite more than 270,000 people signing an online petition against the measure.
Attitudes towards gay people in Russia and former Soviet states are largely shaped by repressive Stalin-era policies, when sodomy was punishable by up to five years in jail.
President Vladimir Putin, who is looking to boost his support among conservative voters, has given the Orthodox Church a more public role as a moral authority as Russia experiences a religious revival since the fall of Communism.
Russian Orthodox church leader Patriarch Kirill told Jagland on last month that his Church must remind people that homosexuality is a “sin before God”.
While the number of documented cases of violence against gays in Russia is low, rights group Sova, which tracks extremist violence, says attacks on gays rose sharply after discussion of the nationwide ban.
A 23-year-old man was tortured and killed in a brutal attack in the Russian southern town of Volgograd. He was raped with beer bottles, and killed, after revealing he was gay.
A Brief about Thorbjørn Jagland: “Scratch my Back, I scratch yours”
Jagland served as Prime Minister of Norway from 1996 to 1997, as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2000 to 2001 and as President of the Storting from 2005 to 2009. Prior to becoming Prime Minister, Jagland served as party secretary from 1986 to 1992, and subsequently party leader until 2002, when he was succeeded by Jens Stoltenberg. He did not run for reelection to parliament in 2009.
To this day, the White House public relation officials and Anglo-Saxon media want to hide from the public and would never report about the the despicable relationship between Barack Obama and the Nobel Committee, its grotesque staging or the method used to bribe the Nobel jury and divert the prize from its original purpose.
You can read here how Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize, but this is the excerpt of what went on in a nutshell with Jagland’s involvement:
In 2006, the European Command (i.e. the regional command of U.S. troops whose authority then covered both Europe and most of Africa) solicited Barack Obama, a Senator of Kenyan origin, to participate in a secret inter-agency (CIA-NED-USAID-NSA). The goal was to use his status as a parliamentarian to conduct a tour of Africa that would allow both to defend the interests of pharmaceutical companies (against off-patent productions) and to counter Chinese influence in Kenya and Sudan by destabilizing Kenya through toppling President Kibaki and impose a devoted opportunist: Raila Odinga. Just like what happened in Arabsping, Libya, Syria, Tunisia, Yemen and many other parts in the world, the National Endowment for Democracy oversaw the creation of a new political party, the Orange Democratic Movement, and plotted a “color revolution” in the forthcoming parliamentary elections of December 2007. Senator Obama, whose journey was hyper-publicized by the American media, behind the scenes, he interfered in local Kenyan politics and participated in Raila Odinga meetings calling for a “democratic revolution”. His “companion”, General Gration, gave Odinga one million dollars in cash to fuel the destabilization of the country and raised official protests from Nairobi to Washington.
As the operation continued, Madeleine Albright, as NDI President (the branch of the National Endowment for Democracy that specializes in handling left-wing parties) travelled to Nairobi, where she oversaw the organization of the Orange Movement. Then John McCain, as chairman of the IRI (the branch of the National Endowment for Democracy that specializes in handling right-wing parties) complemented the opposition coalition in dealing with small right-wing organizations.
During the parliamentary elections of December 2007, a survey funded by USAID announces the victory of Odinga. On election day, John McCain announced that President Kibaki rigged the election in favor of his party and that in fact the opposition led by Odinga had won. The NSA, in conjunction with local phone operators, sent anonymous text messages to the population. In areas populated by the Luo (Odinga’s ethnic group), they read “Dear Kenyans, the Kikuyu have stolen our children’s future… We must treat them in the only way that they understand… with violence.” In areas populated by Kikuyu, they read: “The blood of any innocent Kikuyu will be paid. We will slaughter them right to the heart of the capital. For Justice, establish a list of Luos that you know. We will send you the phone numbers to call with such information.” Within days, this peaceful country sank into sectarian violence. The riots caused over 1 000 deaths and 300 000 displaced. 500 000 jobs were lost.
Madeleine Albright came back. She offered to mediate between President Kibaki and the opposition trying to overthrow him. With finesse, she stepped aside and placed in the spotlight the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights. The board of this respected NGO was newly chaired by the former Prime Minister of Norway, Thorbjørn Jagland.
Breaking with the Center’s traditional impartiality, he sent two mediators on site, whose expenses were entirely footed by Madeleine Albright’s NDI (that is to say ultimately out of the U.S. Department of State’s budget): another former Norwegian Prime Minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik, and former UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan (the Ghanaian is very much on the scene in Scandinavian states since he married the niece of Raoul Wallenberg). Compelled to accept the compromises forced on him in order to restore civil peace, President Kibaki agreed to create a prime minister post and to entrust it to Raila Odinga, who immediately began reducing trade with China.
Thorbjørn Jagland negotiated an agreement between the National Endowment for Democracy and the Oslo Center, which was formalized in September 2008. An attached foundation was created in Minneapolis that allows the CIA to indirectly subsidize the Norwegian NGO. It acts on behalf of Washington in Morocco and especially in Somalia.
Here’s how they exchanged their ‘small gifts’ with each other:
Obama was elected President of the United States. Odinga declared several days of national holiday in Kenya to celebrate the outcome of the election in the United States. General Jones became a national security adviser. He appointed Mark Lippert as Chief of Staff and General Gration as Deputy. During the presidential transition in the U.S., the President of the Oslo Center, Thorbjørn Jagland, was elected chairman of the Nobel Committee, despite the risk that such a crafty politician would pose to the institution. The nomination of Barack Obama for the Nobel Peace prize was filed no later than January 31, 2009 (regulatory deadline), twelve days after he took office in the White House. On September 29, Thorbjørn Jagland was elected Secretary General of the Council of Europe following a behind-the-scenes agreement between Washington and Moscow. This called for a favor in return.
After the announcement of Barack Obama as winner of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, the main opposition parties, the Progress Party and the Conservative Party, as well as several voices within his own Labour Party, demanded that Jagland resign his position as Chairman of the Nobel Committee, “in light of the award” as one party leader said, citing concerns that he may compromise the committee’s independence when he simultaneously is head of the Council of Europe.
Although membership of the Nobel Committee is incompatible with a major executive political position, Jagland did not resign. He argued that the law strictly prohibits the combination with a ministerial office but says nothing about the Council of Europe.
Jagland then returned to Oslo on October 2. The same day, the Committee appointed President Obama for the 2009 Peace prize.
President Barack Obama gives on May 29, 2012 Madeleine Albright the Presidential Medal of Freedom, an award bestowed by the President of the United States and is—along with the comparable Congressional Gold Medal bestowed by an act of U.S. Congress—the highest civilian award in the United States. It recognizes those individuals who have made “an especially meritorious contribution to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors”.
Can anyone understand why China wants an official apology from Norway awarding a Chinese disrespectful criminal who has been funded by National Endowment for Democracy to destabilize China?
