Horowitz asks Peres to avoid receiving Russian delegation

Delegation of Russian journalists is headed by Dmitri Kiselyov, who has made outspoken homophobic remarks; Peres set to meet with them Wednesday.

By GREER FAY CASHMAN
nitzan horowitz 311 (photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski)
nitzan horowitz 311
(photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski)
MK Horowitz asks Peres to cancel Russian reception • By GREER FAY CASHMAN MK Nitzan Horowitz has written to President Shimon Peres asking him to refrain from receiving a delegation of Russian journalists headed by Dmitri Kiselyov.
President Vladimir Putin recently appointed Kiselyov to head Rossia Segodnya (“Russia Today”), a new venture that has replaced RIA Novosti, which Putin ordered closed on December 9 after more than 73 years as the state’s news agency.
Kiselyov has said on his radio show that homosexuals should not be permitted to donate blood and organs, and that if a homosexual died in a car accident, his or her heart should be considered unfit to transplant into someone else, but should be burned. He also said that organizers of gay pride parades should be ashamed of themselves.
He has been no less outspoken on political issues, and has made venomous remarks about anti-government protesters in Ukraine.
Horowitz (Meretz), a former journalist and a member of Tel Aviv’s gay community, wrote to Peres that Kiselyov is an extremist who is known in Russia for his outrageous incitement against the opposition and the LGBT community.
Ayelet Frish, the media adviser and spokeswoman for the president, told The Jerusalem Post that Peres would go ahead with the meeting on Wednesday, but that he would talk about democracy and the right to be different in the hope that Kiselyov would get the message.
It would be a mistake to cancel a face-to-face meeting with a delegation of some 25 foreign journalists, she said.