Hundreds of thousands of people in Madrid have made a mark for the rights of gays, lesbians and transgender people. Police say around 400,000 people who participated in the Gay Pride parade celebrated yesterday in the Spanish capital the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall protests in the US, a turning point for the gay movement.
On June 28, 1969, police stormed the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar on Christopher Street in New York’s Greenwich Village. It was followed by days of heavy clashes between activists and security forces. The protests are considered one of the starting points of the Homosexual Rights Movement in the United States.
One year after the protests began, groups in front of the Stonewall Inn recalled the events – the birth of Gay Pride. In Spain, homosexuality was still illegal under dictator Francisco Franco at the time. It was not until 1978, three years after Franco’s death, that the homophobic laws were changed.
