Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Europride 2020 in Thessaloniki was rearranged for 2024. In this article you can see how Thessaloniki was chosen for hosting the Europride, as well as photos from ThessalonikiPride 2019.

Accepting diversity, the symbolism of the rainbow flag, positive mottos such as “Love Always Wins” (Η ΑΓΑΠΗ ΠΑΝΤΑ ΝΙΚΑΕΙ), and people fighting for equal rights and against all types of discrimination is what Thessaloniki Pride is all about. Here are some milestones and some interesting facts about Thessaloniki Pride:

• Thessaloniki Pride took place for the first time on June 22-23, 2012, with the support of the new, at the time, mayor of the city, Yiannis Boutaris. That first year the participation was about 1,000 people. Since then, the event is organized annually every June.
• Two years later, in 2014, Thessaloniki was the European Youth Capital and Thessaloniki Pride was included in its official program. The participants in the parade during that year reached the number of 10,000.
• In the next years, Thessaloniki Pride kept growing attracting people not only from Greece but also from the neighboring Balkan countries. The participants in the last Thessaloniki Pride, in 2019, were almost 20,000 people.
• The stance of the Greek Orthodox Church, and especially that of the Metropolitan Anthimos of Thessaloniki, was strongly negative from the beginning of the pride festival and still is.
• Despite a few people have organized counter-demonstrations in the past, there have never occurred any violent incidents during Thessaloniki Pride.
• During the night after the parade, the White Tower, the symbol of the city, is illuminated with the colors of the rainbow. The White Tower is the starting and the ending point of the parade and the place where the main large concert of the festival takes place afterward.

For more information, you can visit Thessaloniki’s Pride official webpage. To see more annual events that take place in the city of Thessaloniki, click here.