Tens of thousands of people gathered for the march of Budapest Pride, defying the legal threats of the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban against militants of LGBTQ rights.
The organizers of the march hope for record attendance, despite the growing pressure of the nationalist conservative politicians and police to stop any exposure of pro-LGBTQ equipment.
The police have prohibited in accordance with a new “Child Protection” law limiting the rallies considered to promote homosexuality. A woman said she was present because she wanted a country of “diversity” for her children.
Orban has minimized the possibility of violent clashes between the police and the participants, but warned against the potential legal impact for the participants.
“Of course, the police could break such events, because they have the power to do so, but Hungary is a civilized country, a civic society. We are not injured,” he said on Friday on the radio.
“There will be legal consequences, but it cannot reach the level of physical violence.”
Participants risk a fine of up to € 500 (£ 427; $ 586), the police authorized to use facial recognition technology to identify them.
The organizers could incur a one -year prison sentence.
Luca, 34, who plans to attend with her Enikö mother, said that they wanted a country of “diversity” that she said that they do not currently have them.
“We have a law that forbids people who are different from the others to bring together. This is why we are here. Because it affects our rights. This is why we have come.”
She told the BBC that she was worried about the future of her four -year -old daughter “in a country where she cannot love anyone she wants.”
Barnabás said he was busy “expressing my solidarity with the LGBTQ community … because I know what it does not be seen and being treated like a pariah, that everyone here is obviously not”.
Not part of the community himself, the 22-year-old said he came from the campaign, where people “are more likely to be xenophobic and homophobic”.
The EU equality commissioner Hadja Lahbib, a former Belgian foreign minister, is in Budapest and should join the march.
Friday, she posted a photo showing her position with the liberal mayor of Budapest Gergely Karacsony in front of a rainbow flag symbolizing the rights of homosexuals.
The march of pride “will be a powerful symbol of the force of civil society,” she wrote on X.
Dozens of members of the European Parliament (MEPS) also had to be present.
The Finnish deputy Li Andersson said that he was important for her and her European colleagues to be there to show solidarity with the LGBTQI community of Hungary and civil society.
“It is important to emphasize that the reason why we are here is not only pride – it is the fundamental rights of all of us.”
She added that she thinks that Orban uses arguments on family values as a pretext to prohibit walking.
“”[It’s] A march which fundamentally concerns equality and equality of rights for anyone – for everyone, on the right to love and live with anyone you choose.
“And I think it is a fundamental value that all free and democratic society should respect.”
Karacsony, a member of the opposition of Hungary, insisted that no one assistant to the march can face reprisals because it was co-organized by the Town Hall, and as such is a municipal event which does not require the approval of the police.
Before pride, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, asked the Orban government not to block the march.
Orban was not imperturbable, asking it “to refrain from interfere in the affairs of the law application” of the EU member countries.
