From the Senate floor on Tuesday,
Florida Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican, called on the U.S. to do
more to help stop the persecution of gay men in Chechnya.
Reports of police in Chechnya, a
Muslim-majority republic of Russia, torturing and killing men
suspected of being gay or bisexual started appearing earlier this
month.
Rubio called on the U.S. government to
“do more to ensure that all people are protected and those who harm
them are held responsible.”
“We should use our voice on the
global stage to call attention to these horrifying acts and to ensure
that they are condemned in an appropriate way, ultimately in the
hopes that they will be stopped,” Rubio said.
“There have been reports in the past
of similar abuses, although these reports seem to be the most brutal
and should provoke anger in all of us,” Rubio said. “We should
never, ever tolerate human rights violations against any person for
their political views, their religious beliefs, or their sexual
orientation.”
Russian newspaper Novaya Gaceta
broke the story, reporting that more than 100 men have been detained
and three killed in the anti-gay campaign, including several
well-known local television personalities and religious figures. The
men are reportedly being held in six “concentration camps.”
It should be noted that Rubio's voting
record on LGBT rights has earned the former presidential candidate a
zero rating on the Human Rights Campaign's (HRC) latest Congressional
Scorecard.
(Related: Ted
Cruz, Marco Rubio score zero on HRC survey of LGBT support.)