MOSCOW (AP) — Chechnya’s strongman leader has harshly denounced claims that his southern Russian republic has tortured and even killed gay men, denying that there even are any homosexual men in his region.
Kremlin-backed Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov has faced wide international criticism since a Russian newspaper reported this spring that his security forces had detained some 100 gay men, torturing or killing some of them.
“This is nonsense. We don’t have those kinds of people here. We don’t have any gays. If there are any, take them to Canada,” Kadyrov says in an interview with HBO Real Sports cable television show. HBO released excerpts of the June 30 interview on Friday.
Kadyrov also called those making the allegations “devils.”
“God damn them for what they are accusing us of,” he said.
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