A State Security Administration (SSA) serviceman is being investigated after allegedly attacking a man in central Kyiv on Aug. 1.
Yevhen Honcharenko, a backup dancer for Ukrainian pop singer Nadya Dorofeeva, was assaulted outside of Lift, a gay nightclub in Kyiv. He was hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage and placed in a medically induced coma, according to Dorofeeva.
The SSA, a law enforcement agency that provides security to state officials, has removed suspect Yevhen Bezpalyi from duty during an internal investigation. The State Bureau of Investigations (DBR), the state agency that investigates criminal proceedings involving law enforcement officers, judges and senior officials, suspects Bezpalyi of intentional grievous bodily harm.
KyivPride, an LGBTQ advocacy nonprofit, cited the victim’s friends in labeling the attack as homophobic and provoked by Goncharenko’s gender non-conforming looks.
“How many more incidents of this kind do we need for attacks to stop?” KyivPride wrote on Instagram.
According to Dorofeeva, Goncharenko left the nightclub with friends and was first pushed, then hit against a fence repeatedly.
The DBR said that the attacker hit the young man hard in the face, causing him a severe closed traumatic brain injury, a concussion, a linear fracture of the temporal bone and other injuries.
Dorofeeva posted images and a video of Bezpalyi as a public plea to ask for help in identifying the man.
Soon after that, in a rare instance of state agencies acknowledging the possible involvement of their employees in criminal actions, the SSA confirmed the identity of the alleged attacker. In an official statement published on Aug. 1, the SSA said it would cooperate with the investigation and provide Honcharenko with any help needed for his treatment.
The DBR started criminal proceedings into the assault, according to an official statement published on Aug. 2. The bureau said it had interrogated witnesses and obtained video recordings from surveillance cameras and witnesses.
If found guilty, Bezpalyi faces up to eight years in prison.
The accident comes just days after the Rave Pride protest for LGBTQ rights took place outside of the President’s Office on July 30. Rave Pride was delayed because of the attacks by far-right groups.
Despite Ukraine’s progress in the area of human rights, attacks on the LGBTQ community are still rampant. Some are committed by organized far-right groups, others by regular individuals.
If investigated, these incidents are not identified as hate crimes on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity, since Ukrainian legislation doesn’t provide for such criminal liability. Local human rights activists have been advocating for legal protection for the community for years.
Prime Minister Dmytro Shmygal introduced a bill that ensures criminal liability in cases of discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity on May 13. Human rights and civil organizations have been actively campaigning for the adoption of the bill since but it hasn’t been considered by the parliament yet.
