The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Russia’s banning of gay parades in Moscow violated rights of assembly, and fined it for discriminating on grounds of sexual orientation, ordering it to pay the legal fees of Nikolai Alexeyev, the activist who brought the case to court.  Alexeyev hailed the ruling as ‘a crippling blow to Russian homophobia on all accounts‘.  The Strategy 31 protesters are challenging Moscow’s 200-person limit on their protest in Triumfalnaya Square later this month.  Protesters in Kirov, Yekaterinburg, Moscow, and members of the Other Russia, are urging Russians to boycott the currently ongoing (voluntary) census on grounds that it allows the government to gather information about potential dissenters.  Journalist Mikhail Beketov, whose current condition after being beaten in 2008 means that ‘he must travel to court by ambulance, accompanied by doctors‘, failed to show up at trial for a libel case against him.