Merkel urges Putin to intervene over anti-gay purge in Chechnya

Angela Merkel has urged Vladimir Putin to investigate reports of the torture and persecution of gay men in Chechnya and to ensure the safety of LGBT people across the region.

The German chancellor, making her first visit to Russia for two years, said she had raised the issue with the Russian President along with other human rights concerns.

A violent crackdown on gay people in Chechnya was first reported in the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, which has alleged that more than 100 Chechen men suspected of being gay have been rounded up and at least three killed.

Homophobia is widespread in Chechnya, a mainly Muslim region run by Ramzan Kadyrov, an authoritarian leader with a notorious private militia who is fiercely loyal to Putin.

The Kremlin has supported Kadyrov’s denials of an anti-gay purge, arguing that it has no information to back research carried out by journalists and human rights organisations.

During a joint press conference with Putin at his summer retreat in Sochi on the Black Sea coast, Merkel said she had received “negative reports on the way that homosexuals are dealt with, particularly in Chechnya”.

"I asked President Putin to use his influence to guarantee the rights of minorities," she added.

Western governments and human rights groups have called on Russian authorities to investigate the reports of repression in Chechnya, where society is strictly conservative even by Russia standards.

Merkel also raised concerns over restrictions on the freedom of assembly in Russia, following the arrest by riot police of people demonstrating against the anti-gay campaign.

“It is important to have the right to demonstrate in a democracy, and the role of NGOs is very important,” Merkel said.