In Russia's shadow, LGBTQ people across the Baltics fight for their rights

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

58% : "Many of the laws taken in the early years were influenced by the wish to enter the European Union in 2004," Mäletjärv said.
56% : We grew up in the European Union.
53% : Under Soviet occupation from 1944 until 1991, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia all joined the European Union in 2004, together with other countries of the Eastern bloc, including Poland and Hungary.
46% : Estonia is, for example, the only Baltic country that has so far introduced civil unions for same-sex couples.
46% : Both the Lithuanian and the Latvian parliaments are currently debating similar bills that would introduce civil partnerships for same-sex couples, granting them some -- but not all -- the rights of marriage.
44% : The USSR made same-sex relations a crime in 1933, and it wasn't until 1993 that Lithuania, already an independent country, decriminalized homosexuality.
44% : A bloc of Ukrainian LGBTQ refugees and allies, as well as other migrants who have been living in Lithuania for longer, held banners calling for LGBTQ equality and peace in their mother tongue.
43% : But same-sex marriage is still years away, she said: "When people realize that civil unions don't affect them in any way, we will change the public opinion step by step.
34% : Yet, the "gay propaganda" law is being challenged at the European Court of Human Rights after a fairy-tale book featuring same-sex couples was sold with stickers saying it was not suitable for those younger than 14.

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