Very Few Big Events Are Happening. Here, a Huge March

LGBT rally takes place in Taipei, Taiwan, where COVID has been kept at bay
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Oct 31, 2020 8:30 AM CDT
Huge LGBT Rally Takes Place in Nation That's Curbed COVID
Participants march through the street during a pride parade in Taipei, Taiwan, on Saturday.   (AP Photo/Chiang Ying-ying)

A huge and festive crowd marched in Taiwan's capital on Saturday in an annual LGBT Pride event. Turnout was down from last year, but organizers said it still topped 100,000 on a mostly sunny day in Taipei. Many participants didn't wear protective masks, but others did, some in rainbow colors, per the AP. While many Pride events elsewhere moved online this year because of COVID-19, Taiwan has largely kept the pandemic at bay. The self-governing island of 24 million people has recorded 555 cases of the coronavirus and hasn't had a locally spread case in more than 200 days.

"While the rest of the world is stuck in the pandemic, we can still organize such a massive event," says Zoe Tsao, who works in digital marketing. "This, I think, is great and very precious." International travel restrictions did reduce the number of participants coming from abroad this year. Taiwan became the first and only place in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage last year. Two lesbian couples tied the knot in a mass wedding held by Taiwan's military on Friday. The mass wedding with 188 couples was the first time same-sex couples have been wed and celebrated at a military ceremony.

(More Taiwan stories.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X