Police in Kyrgyzstan are using false nicknames on LGBT dating apps to entrap gay and bisexual men, an NGO activist has told PinkNews.

Nazik, an advocate for LGBT+ rights in Kyrgzstan, has been “beaten with a bottle” because she is a lesbian. “I know dozens of cases myself and I personally had to deal with very aggressive and homophobic police,” she told PinkNews.

“My gay friend and I were attacked by a group of men in a park. They beat us up. They hit me on the head with a bottle because I am a lesbian, my friend is gay and we do not look the way people should look in Kyrgyzstan. “When we called the police asking to protect us, they acted very unprofessionally and expressed their homophobic views.

“They asked me whether I was married or not and what my sexual orientation was. And when I tried to write a complaint against the perpetrators they did not want to accept it.”

Strongly influenced by Russian politics, Kyrgyzstan is an increasingly hostile environment when it comes to LGBT+ rights. The Kyrgyz government even “copied Russian legislation” to draft a bill on “gay propaganda.”

Police reportedly target gay and bisexual men on dating apps with the aim to blackmail them for sums ranging between 5000 and 30,000 soms – the equivalent of around 70 and 500 US dollars. “What happens very often is that police collaborators register on dating sites using various nicknames,” Nazik explained. Read more via Pink News