Raid is part of Moscow\u2019s hardline social conservatism and clampdown on political life.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Published On 21 Apr 2026<\/span>21 Apr 2026<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Russian police have raided the country\u2019s top publishing house on suspicion that it has been disseminating \u201chomosexual propaganda\u201d, local media report.<\/p>\n Police reportedly seized thousands of books on Tuesday and took Yevgeny Kapiev, the chief executive of Eksmo, in for questioning. The raid appears to be part of Moscow\u2019s pivot to hardline social conservatism\u00a0with repressive laws running alongside a clampdown on political life and aggressive foreign policy.<\/p>\n list of 4 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n Police targeted Kapiev as part of a \u201ccriminal case on extremism\u201d over the publication of books \u201cdealing with LGBT themes\u201d, Eksmo communications director Yekaterina Kozhanova told the AFP news agency.<\/p>\n The firm\u2019s finance director, head of distribution and deputy commercial director were also interrogated, Kozhanova said.<\/p>\n Eksmo is suspected of unofficially marketing books, including novels, that promote \u201cgay propaganda\u201d to Russian youth, the broadcaster Ren-TV reported.<\/p>\n An investigation into Eksmo was opened last year when authorities said \u201cLGBT propaganda\u201d had been \u201cdetected\u201d in books published by its Popcorn Books subsidiary and they arrested several members of its staff.<\/p>\n Books showing approval of same-sex relations have been banned in Russia for more than 10 years.<\/p>\n The law has been tightened recently, requiring publishers to remove publications and destroy entire editions if they depict same-sex relationships.<\/p>\n The persecution of LGBTQ individuals, organisations and communities has intensified in the past decade or so as the Kremlin heralds \u201ctraditional values\u201d. That drive has included a crackdown on films, books, art and culture, among other areas of social life.<\/p>\n Cultural producers have faced significant pressure even when they focus on giants of Russian culture. Biographies of Mikhail Bulgakov, author of The Master and Margarita, and the poet, actor and singer Vladimir Vysotsky have to be marked with warning labels because they are seen as promoting drug-taking.<\/p>\n The ultraconservative social turn has accelerated since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.<\/p>\n In 2023, Russia\u2019s Supreme Court ruled that LGBTQ activists should be designated as \u201cextremists\u201d and banned activities of the \u201cinternational LGBTQ movement\u201d.<\/p>\n Courts have issued fines and jail sentences to people displaying LGBTQ \u201csymbols\u201d, such as clothes, jewellery or posters featuring the rainbow flag.<\/p>\n Out of 49 European countries, the Rainbow Europe organisation ranked Russia third from bottom in terms of tolerance of LGBTQ people.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Raid is part of Moscow\u2019s hardline social conservatism and clampdown on political life. Published On 21 Apr 202621 Apr 2026 Russian police have raided the country\u2019s top publishing house on suspicion that it has been disseminating \u201chomosexual propaganda\u201d, local media report. Police reportedly seized thousands of books on Tuesday and took Yevgeny Kapiev, the chief […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19855,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Headshot-1-1706763439.jpg?resize=96%2C96&quality=80)
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