Summary of human rights violations documented during the first half of 2026

Throughout 2026, Pink Human Rights Defender NGO continued providing LGBT+ people with legal, social worker, and psychological counselling and support. Between January and July 2026, the organisation’s specialists provided 507 psychological consultations, 221 social work consultations, and 248 legal consultations. The organisation also received 580 calls to its hotline. This article provides a summary of the nature of violations identified during legal and social work consultations in the first six months of the year. 

In total, the organisation’s lawyers and social workers provided 469 consultations during which 32 cases of violations were documented. Most cases involved multiple violations rather than a single type of violation. Problems faced by LGBT+ people often begin as bullying, psychological pressure, non-acceptance, or discriminatory treatment, but in some cases escalate into more serious forms of abuse, including threats, extortion, physical or sexual violence. 

Although the multifaceted nature of these violations means that they cannot always be confined to a single category of rights violation, threats and psychological pressure were the most prevalent forms. In many cases, targeted individuals were threatened with murder, physical assault, stalking, disclosure of their sexual orientation within their family or workplace or being “punished” because of their identity. 

In some cases, sexual orientation was used as a tool of extortion, as has also been documented repeatedly in previous years. In such cases, perpetrators threatened to disclose the person’s sexual orientation unless the targeted individual complied with their demands. 

The second major category was physical violence. Cases included beatings, group attacks, and assaults involving objects used to strike targeted individuals. 

As in previous years, domestic violence was also among the most prevalent categories of violations documented this year. These cases included physical violence, restriction of freedom, threats, psychological pressure, threats of eviction from the family home, and coercion into conversion “therapy.” As research has demonstrated, such practices can amount in severity to inhuman or degrading treatment. 

The hate motivation of perpetrators was often explicit in their statements, particularly when they emphasised that “people like this” have no right to live or be present in a particular place, that they should be “eliminated,” “corrected,” or forced to change their identity. 

Of the 32 documented cases, only 5 targeted individuals approached law enforcement authorities. 

One additional case occurred in the Russian Federation, after which the persecution continued in Armenia. It is therefore included in the overall count of documented cases; however, the targeted individual reported the incident to law enforcement authorities in Russia. 

The picture is not unequivocally positive even among the five cases in which targeted individuals in Armenia approached law enforcement authorities: 

Case 1: Following multiple emergency calls, no action was taken at the initial stage. 

Case 2: The investigative body did not initiate proceedings and only did so after being compelled by a court decision. 

Case 3: Following a call to the police, there was a significant delay in reaching the scene, and the investigator contacted the targeted individuals only five days later. 

Case 4: The report was accepted; however, the targeted individual described discriminatory treatment, retargeted individualisation, and attempts to justify the violence. 

Case 5: The police demonstrated an unsupportive attitude, and there is no information regarding the subsequent handling of the report. 

Thus, the continued low level of reporting to law enforcement and use of legal protection mechanisms remains a concern in the first half of 2026. 

The reasons for not reporting violations are recurring and systemic: 

• Distrust of the police, which is among the most frequently cited reasons. 

• Fear that approaching law enforcement will lead to the disclosure of one’s sexual orientation or gender identity. 

• Fear of discriminatory or degrading treatment. 

• Fear of further violence from family members, particularly in the case of minors. 

• Concerns about the inability to maintain confidentiality in a small community or town. 

In some cases, targeted individuals attempt to resolve the situation through other means, such as simply leaving the dangerous environment. 

Therefore, the high rate of non-reporting should not necessarily be interpreted as an indication that such cases are rare or less severe. On the contrary, the documented accounts demonstrate that fear, stigma, and distrust in the system can significantly reduce the official reporting of crimes and violations. 

Cases documented by social workers reveal another concerning pattern: targeted individuals may not even wish to seek legal advice. These cases particularly highlight situations that may never reach the criminal justice system, such as bullying in the workplace or at university, family rejection, psychological pressure, and humiliation within social environments. 

Therefore, assessing the actual scale of violations against LGBT+ people solely on the basis of cases reported to the police or investigative authorities may significantly underestimate the scope of the problem.