Russian President Vladimir Putin has
claimed that the anti-gay law he signed “does not hurt anyone.”
Putin appeared on ABC's This Week
to promote next month's Winter Olympics to be held in Sochi.
“It seems to me that the law that we
have adopted does not hurt anyone,” Putin told George
Stephanopoulos.
The law, which prohibits the promotion
of “gay propaganda” to minors, was used over the weekend to
arrest a man for waving a rainbow flag, a symbol of gay pride, as the
Olympic torch passed through Voronezh, the
AP reported.
Stephanopoulos asked whether visitors
attending the Sochi Games would be arrested for protesting.
“Acts of protest and acts of
propaganda are somewhat different things,” Putin answered. “They
are close, but if we were to look at them from the legal perspective,
then protesting a law does not amount to propaganda of sexuality or
sexual abuse of children. That's one. Two is that I'd like to ask
our colleagues, my colleagues and friends, that as they try to
criticize us, they would do well to set their own house in order
first. I did say, after all, and this is public knowledge, that in
some of the states in the U.S., homosexuality remains a felony.”
Stephanopoulos noted that “the
Supreme Court has struck those laws down.”
Putin
continued: “How are they in a position to criticize us for what
is a much softer, liberal approach to these issues than in their own
country? I know that this isn't something that can be easily done.
This is so because there are a lot of folks in the U.S. who share the
view that the legislation in their state or in their nation is
appropriate, well grounded, and is in sync with the sentiment of the
vast majority of the population.”
And he insisted that “in this
country, everybody is absolutely equal to anybody else, irrespective
of one's religion, sex, ethnicity or sexual orientation.”
“So no concerns exist for people who
intend to come as athletes or visitors to the Olympics,” Putin
said.