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Russia's law banning gender transition (officially the law "on amendments to certain legislative acts of the Russian Federation") was adopted by the State Duma on 14 July 2023, then approved by the Federation Council on 19 July 2023 and, after being signed by President Vladimir Putin, entered into force on 24 July 2023. The law has been heavily criticized by human rights activists, LGBT activists, and the medical community; Human Rights Watch described it as violating human rights. It prohibits medical interventions required by transgender people and included in internationally accepted standards of care. The law also gives the right to perform surgical operations on intersex children without their consent or medical necessity.

The law amends the federal law "on the fundamentals of protecting the health of citizens in the Russian Federation", as well as the law "on acts of civil status"and the Family Code, adding a ban on gender transition ("sex change" in the authors’ terminology).

Background
In the Soviet Union, sex reassignment operations were both possible and practiced. From 1970–1972, Surgeon Victor Kalnberz performed the country's first sex reassignment surgery. Later, in 1975, a surgical method of sex reassignment was registered as an invention in the country. In 1991, the first methodological recommendations for sex reassignment were created and approved by the USSR Ministry of Health, based on the recommendations of the International Association for Gender Dysphoria (now the World Professional Association for Transgender Health) and the Moscow Psychoendocrinological Center (MGPEC). For the first time, the possibility of gender transition was enshrined in law in 1997.

The first to speak out in favor of banning gender transition was the Minister of Justice Konstantin Chuychenko in April 2023, arguing that it was "consolidating family values ​​at the legislative level".

The human rights organization Human Rights Watch characterizes the adopted law as a continuation of the attack on LGBT rights carried out by the Russian authorities. In September 2022, the Vasileostrovsky District Court of Saint Petersburg declared that it was illegal to dissemination posts on transgender issues on social networks, and in December of the same year, the State Duma expanded the law banning "LGBT propaganda", including information about gender transition.

In it's original version, the bill banning gender transition prohibited medical support for gender transition and sex reassignment. In response to criticism, the bill was tightened in the final version:


 * prohibits changing the gender symbol in the passport;
 * prohibits medical interventions related to the formation in a person of primary or secondary sexual characteristics of the other sex (surgical operations, hormonal therapy, etc.), with the exception of those related to the treatment of congenital anomalies, genetic and endocrine diseases associated with impaired formation of the genital organs in children;
 * annuls marriages performed by transgender people;
 * denies transgender people the right to adopt or guardianship children.

The law also gives the right to perform operations on intersex children without their consent, although, as a rule, this is not medically necessary, and such interventions have risks for the physical and mental health of children.

Context within the Russian invasion of Ukraine
The law was passed against the backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Journalists noted that back in 2022, Russian deputies and officials stated that Russia was not only waging a war with Ukraine, but was continuing a "spiritual struggle with the West". Thus, in the autumn of 2022, State Duma deputies adopted a homophobic law completely banning so-called "LGBT propaganda".

In May 2023, the head of the Investigative Committee of Russia, Alexander Bastrykin, accused those who allegedly perform a "gender change "in documents due to the ongoing mobilization in Russia of "fraud" and "violation of [Russia’s] defense capability".

Measures such as the "ban on LGBT propaganda" and the fight against "propaganda for gender reassignment," according to the Russian authorities, were supposed to help them fight the "new world order". At the same time, Russian deputies regularly conflated the topics of homosexuality, transgender people and pedophilia. Chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin stated: "Russia is the only country that today opposes what is happening in the States and Europe and does everything to preserve the family and traditional values".

Deputy Speaker of the State Duma Pyotr Tolstoy, when discussing the bill banning gender transition, said: "This is not another prohibitive initiative of the State Duma, this is another step in protecting national interests. We accept them because Russia has changed since the start of the 'special military operation'. And those guys who today defend our country with weapons in their hands, they must return to another country".