COLOGNE, Germany >> Round 1 million folks turned out for the Satisfaction parade within the western German metropolis of Cologne on Sunday, both to take part or to observe the colourful festivities.
Round 180 LGBTQ teams and music floats took half within the parade by the town heart — greater than ever earlier than, German information company dpa reported. Organizers stated about 1.2 million guests attended the celebrations, whereas the police estimated the group at round 1 million.
With the parade, Cologne is sending “a powerful sign for variety, for tolerance, in opposition to hate and in opposition to exclusion,” stated Hendrik Wuest, the primary governor from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the place Cologne relies, to attend the town’s parade in its roughly 30-year historical past, dpa reported.
Cologne has one of many greatest LGBTQ communities within the nation.
“In every single place on this planet, sadly additionally in Germany, there are extremists are at work who don’t need to grant us our freedom,” stated Sven Lehmann, the German authorities’s commissioner for the acceptance of sexual and gender variety. “The robust sign from Cologne is: We are going to by no means allow them to take away this freedom.”