Daria Kasatkina breaks her silence

On 18 July 2022, Daria Kasatkina, at the time the highest-ranked Russian tennis player, revealed in an interview published on YouTube that she was in a relationship with a woman. Asked by the blogger Vitya Kravchenko whether she had a girlfriend, the world number twelve simply answered "Yes". Shortly afterwards she posted a photo on her channels with her partner, the figure skater Natalia Zabiiako.

The coming-out was a watershed: Kasatkina was the most prominent person from Russian elite sport ever to have openly described herself as gay. And it came at a delicate moment. Same-sex relationships had not been a criminal offence in Russia since 1993, but the 2013 law against so-called "homosexual propaganda" had repeatedly been used to ban Pride marches and persecute activists. In those very days, the Duma was debating extending the ban to adults and also prohibiting queer content in cinemas.

Kasatkina, who was living in Barcelona at the time of the interview, spoke openly about the consequences. She feared she would never be able to hold her girlfriend's hand in Russia. "Living in the closet is impossible. It's too hard, it's pointless," she said. "Being at peace with yourself is the only thing that matters." In the video she can be seen bursting into tears when asked whether she could ever return to her home country.

The war against Ukraine also came up, which she called a "complete nightmare" and whose end she wished for most of all. She said she had been inspired to take the step by the Russian footballer Nadya Karpova, who had come out a month earlier. It was important, Kasatkina said, for influential people in sport to speak out, especially for young people who were having a hard time and needed support.