Sawt Falasteen - Brussels march urges EU to act over Budapest Pride ban threat

The march followed a law passed in Hungary in March that bans LGBT Pride events and allows facial recognition to identify organisers, a move widely condemned by rights groups and EU officials as an attack on civil liberties.

"We have come to sound the alarm," Viktoria Radvanyi, the chair of Budapest Pride, said while standing on a platform at the event.

"What is really alarming is that we have not seen the (European) Commission take any legal action in two months," said Radvanyi, who wore a rainbow-coloured necklace.

Although she met some Commission representatives on Friday, she accused the EU executive of being "complicit" with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban through its inaction

"Do your job," she said, waving a Hungarian flag -- a slogan immediately taken up by the crowd, who held signs reading "Protect your children from Orban".

"I think it’s really important that we keep turning out for every pride as long as there are people in the world facing discrimination," said Migiel Moens, 39, who was in the crowd with European flag sticking out of his pink shorts.

Roland Papp, a 35-year-old journalist who attended Budapest Pride for years, described a "horrible time".

"People tend to think that once you have your rights, they're not going to be taken away. That's not true," he said.

"Budapest pride had been going on for 30 years and now it's really going back to the horrible times," he said, vowing to be in the Hungarian capital on June 28 for the event.

Budapest mayor Gergely Karacsony, welcomed on stage by two drag queens, vowed that the parade would go ahead.

"Budapest Pride cannot be banned, for the simple reason that love and freedom cannot be banned," said Karacsony, inviting supporters from across Europe to join what organisers hope will be the "biggest, most colourful and most international" pride event ever seen.

Q.Najjar--SF-PST