New Delhi: Tech giant Apple is under scrutiny in Russia where police have started an investigation to see if its gay emojis violate the country's strict homosexual propaganda law. If found guilty by the law for supporting non-traditional relationships, the company could also be fined £10,000 and handed a three month ban.
Some of these emojis depict same sex parents having a child, two men holding each other and lesbians kissing. These emojis are a part of Apple's iOS update 8.3, which was released earlier this year.
The probe began after an orthodox activist and lawyer Yaroslav Mikhailov filed a complaint that the emojis are violating the law of the country. According to the "gay propaganda" legislation which was introduced in Russia in 2013, homosexuality is not a crime in Russia but promotion and display of homosexuality is banned.
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Last year, Vitaly Milonov, the designer of this law had demanded that Apple's CEO Tim Cook should be banned from entering Russia. This happened after Cook came out openly in front of the global media.
In yet another display of how seriously Milonov takes the propaganda, he asked Russia's media watchdog to ban social networking site Facebook over its rainbow flag tool.
According to a survey by Moscow Times, 37% of Russians think that homosexuality is a disease which needs to be cured. Not only this. As per some human right groups, LGBT people are routinely prosecuted under Milonov's prescription.
