“It’s a big step for Ukraine, to start adoption of our legislation to European values,” Olena Shevchenko, chair of Ukrainian LGBTQ and intersex rights group Insight, told The Washington Blade.“We hope our government will recognize LGBTQI people as equal as soon as possible.”In August, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky indicated his support for same-sex civil partnerships and potentially same-sex marriage.Zelensky noted that while Article 51 of the Ukrainian constitution states that, “marriage is based on the free consent of a woman and a man” and that the country’s constitution cannot be changed during the ongoing war with Russia, he directed Ukraine’s prime minister to look into the matter.Ukraine has banned employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity since 2015, and Zelensky promised that he would continue to fight anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination after he met with President Joe Biden at the White House last year.Earlier this month, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law expanding the country’s prohibition on LGBTQ+ “propaganda.” The law effectively outlaws any public expression of LGBTQ+ identity in Russia by banning “any action or the spreading of any information that is considered an attempt to promote homosexuality in public, online, or in films, books or advertising.”"