Pride parade and March for traditional Values held

The first Pride parade was held in Skopje on Thursday. Participants said that this way, LGBTI people were demanding protection and support for human rights. There was a big number of police officers. Support for Skopje pride was expressed by, among others, singer Tamara Todevska, the US Embassy in Macedonia and representatives of the authorities. The Government supported the parade with a Facebook post on its official Facebook page. On the same social network, President Stevo Pendarovski, too, expressed support. As he wrote, sexual orientation and gender identity shouldn’t be grounds for discrimination. The same day, a march for traditional values was held in the capital. “The message is that a father and a mother should be parents, not a woman and a woman or a man and a man,” a participant in that event said. Representatives of 19 NGOs pledging for a traditional family and of religious communities signed a declaration for preservation of family values. MOC members are of the opinion that some centres of powers delude and manipulate homosexuals. At the same time, they said they didn’t have a problem with the LGBT community. Bishop Agatangel used stricter tones, that is, he held an anti-LGBT speech, 24 TV reported. No politician participated in that event. World Macedonian Congress President Todor Petrov was spotted among the participants.