Slovenian participation at the Pride Parade in Berlin

On Saturday, 23rd July 2016, Slovenia took part in one of the biggest Pride Parades in the world, the so-called Christopher Street Day (CSD) in Berlin, for the second time. The presentation of Slovenia was organised by the Embassy of the Republic of Slovenia in Berlin in cooperation with the Turizem Ljubljana public institute and the Slovenian Tourist Board. On Saturday, at 12.00 o’clock, the Berlin mayor, Michael Müller, together with other ambassadors, including the Slovenian Ambassadress to Germany, Marta Kos Marko, opened the Parade.

At this Parade, which is one of the biggest in the world and visited by 1-1.5 million people, there were 43 groups attending, among them some other embassies.

The basic motive of the Slovenian presentation at CSD 2016 was to promote the diversity of Slovenia from the perspective of tourism as well as in the sense of developing respect for different people. Of course, we have also added photographs of significant destinations, the slogan “I feel Slovenia” and the logo of Turizem Ljubljana, which had already aroused a lot of attention during the preparation of the Slovenian show truck for the Berlin Parade. The image of the show truck is the work of the Slovenian designer, Gregor Drobnič, who lives in Berlin and made his name with the brand “Otto von Berlin”.

The City of Ljubljana was presented as a city that is open and tolerant towards those who are different, and the slogan of the Ljubljana mayor Zoran Janković, “Living together by respecting diversity” was prominently displayed. At the same time, Ljubljana was promoted as the European Green Capital 2016. We are especially happy that the city’s emblem, the Ljubljana Dragon, again took part in the Parade.

The Ambassadress of the Republic of Slovenia to Berlin, Marta Kos Marko, MSc, described the event with the following words: “I am proud that Slovenia, as a liberal and open country, has presented itself for the second time at the largest German demonstration for the rights of the LGBT community. Slovenia has itself experienced that not all take the equality of rights of homosexuals for granted. If it is true that the European Union is a value, then we should put our efforts into making Slovenia and the EU better – in such a way that those who are different will also benefit from equal rights. A very important document that is over 68 years old – the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – enshrines in Article 1 that: ‘All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.’ This is something we still need to fight for. Even more so, because LGBT rights are also human rights.”