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BUCHAREST, Jul 3 (IPS) - The attack on Bulgarian gays at their first gay pride march is symptomatic of widespread opposition to the movement.

At Bulgaria's first gay pride march © BGO Gemini The march Saturday last week in the capital Sofia under the motto "Me and My Family" came alongside other first-time pride marches around the world, one in Delhi, India, and another in Brno, the second largest city in the Czech Republic. A first gay pride march was also planned in Cuba last week, but was ultimately cancelled.

Between 150 and 200 people participated in the Bulgarian march.

An attempt had been made in 2005 to organize a "gay national week" in the Bulgarian city Varna on the Black Sea coast, but the municipality refused to authorize the events.

This year, the Sofia municipality proved exceptionally open to the idea of a pride event. "The mayor of Sofia was put under severe political, religious, and societal pressure to cancel the pride," says Aksinia Gencheva, executive director of BGO Gemini, the main organization fighting for the rights of sexual minorities in Bulgaria, and an organizer of the march.

Under conflicting pressure from opponents and supporters of the pride parade, Sofia authorities changed the scheduled route for the march twice before Saturday. The march was first supposed to take place on Vitosha Boulevard, the main promenade and shopping street in the capital. Later, it was relocated to the Southern Park, away from the central areas, only to be moved back to the center again, after activists from Gemini argued that Southern Park would be a more dangerous location.

Participants in the parade called for a peaceful event, and proposed an inclusive message. One banner read: "Be careful who you hate -- it might be someone you love."

But this call did not get through to the bunch of extremists gathered to attack the marchers. Eighty-eight people were arrested for throwing rocks, firecrackers, and Molotov cocktails at the participants.

The violence happened in spite of considerable police presence, whose numbers almost equaled those of the participants in the parade.

Just before the rally began, the leader of the extreme-right Bulgarian National Union party, Boyan Rasate, told local reporters that he was ready to do "anything" to prevent the march from happening. Rasate brought his five-year-old daughter to the event, and observers said the little girl was left alone and confused when her father was arrested later during the march.

The Bulgarian National Union became infamous in 2007 when it put together a small national guard -- sporting brown shirts and specific symbols -- which they said would protect Bulgarian citizens from "the threat of the Roma," referring to the minority ethnic group commonly known as Gypsies.

This year, the group organized a "week of intolerance" right before the gay pride march, with the motto "Be normal, be intolerant." The group held seminars on restricting "homosexual ideas" from spreading in society.

The concerns of the extremist group were echoed by religious leaders in Bulgaria.

The head of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Maksim, 93, wrote a letter to ask the mayor of Sofia to stop "this shameful and undignified march" and "not to participate in the fruits of darkness, but counter them."

"Part of our (Bulgarians') mentality is to say: 'I don't discriminate against gay people, I just don't want to see them marching.'"In the same vein, the Office of the Grand Mufti of Bulgaria sent a letter to the media denouncing homosexuality and "the actions of homosexuals, especially when they try impertinently to change public opinion and the moral, religious, and traditional values of Bulgarian society through public happenings like gay parades."

About 6.5 million of the total of 8 million Bulgarians are Christian Orthodox, and close to 1 million are Muslims. Both religions consider homosexuality a sin.

Homosexuality was decriminalized in Bulgaria only in 2002. Some progress has been made since then in acknowledging the rights of sexual minorities.

"Bulgaria now has one of the most progressive and extensive anti-discrimination legislations in Europe," Aksinia Gencheva from Gemini told IPS. "But the problem is not the legislation, it is the lack of political will or state pressure to implement this legislation."

She stresses that the people who attacked the participants in the gay pride were "groups of Nazis, skinheads, nationalists, and football hooligans," but Gencheva believes they are not the only ones intolerant of sexual minorities. "Part of our (Bulgarians') mentality is to say: 'I don't discriminate against gay people, I just don't want to see them marching.'"

While most Bulgarians would probably not cast a stone against participants in a gay march, they do insist on distancing themselves from the gay community.

"I was just passing by with my granddaughter and decided to see what's going on," said Mariana Kostova, an observer of the march, quoted by local media. "I do not approve of this demonstration. I think it is a bad example for the children."

But activists warn that the passivity of many Bulgarians and their skepticism towards the rights of sexual minorities leave room for hate speech to propagate.

"The pride march was a success, if staying alive means a success, and having in mind the great threats against us before the pride," Aksinia Gencheva said. "But for me personally, this does not end with the march because now all of us -- me and my family -- still live in this country where some Bulgarian citizens threw bombs and Molotov cocktails at others, who were just walking down the street. The pride is over, but the wave of hatred is still rising."

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