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Outlook: I survived Chechnya's 'gay purge'

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Amin Dzhabrailov

23/06/2021 GMT

I survived Chechnya's 'gay purge'

BBC World Service - Outlook, I survived Chechnya's 'gay purge'

Amin Dzhabrailov escaped his homeland after being kidnapped and tortured

Amin Dzhabrailov was kidnapped from work and tortured for two weeks as part of an unprecedented gay crackdown in the Russian republic.

In March 2017 Amin Dzhabrailov was dragged out of the hair salon where he worked and bundled into the boot of a car. It was the start of an unprecedented crackdown targeting LGBT people in the Russian republic of Chechnya. Amin says he was taken to a warehouse and tortured alongside other gay men before being outed to his family, who were encouraged to kill him. After his release he knew his life in Chechnya was over and he had to escape - what he couldn't have guessed was where his next steps would take him. Two years later he would go public with his story, defying Chechnya's feared leader and becoming the first Chechen victim of the crackdown to do so. Warning: This programme contains graphic descriptions of torture. 

For decades there was a rule in America that banned girls from playing league games in one of the country's most popular sports - baseball. That was until a determined 12-year-old came along. Outlook's Colm Flynn went to meet Maria Pepe, who fought to get the rules changed in the 1970s. This programme was first broadcast in July 2018. 

Producer: Kevin Ponniah
Presenter: Emily Webb

Picture credit: Amin Dzhabrailov

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