Most people see homosexuality as "something alien", says gay activist Zoryan Kis.
He says same-sex couples are sometimes asked to leave restaurants and that the majority of Ukrainians just want gay people to "leave the country".
And many do leave. Others have suffered homophobic violence, and in the most extreme cases murder. [...]
However, if they bring violence to Kiev's gay pride it is likely to feature prominently - possibly disproportionately - in the media-sphere of Ukraine's eastern neighbour, and be held up as another example of far-right-fuelled instability in Ukraine.
And that leads to the second complication: by pushing gay rights in Ukraine, the US and EU risk feeding a perception, popular in Moscow, that Ukraine today is having unpopular liberal values forced upon it.
