SW News: The Russian lower house has enacted a new law barring gender reassignment, which now awaits approval from the upper house before being forwarded to President Vladimir Putin for his signature. On Wednesday, 400 of the House's 450 members signed the bill.

With the new rule, it would be illegal for the government to change a person's gender on formal papers. Except for fixing birth defects in children, it would be against the law for medical procedures to change a person's main or secondary sex traits. The fundamental goal of the new law, according to Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, is to safeguard youngsters from transgender indoctrination.

Meanwhile, Pyotr Tolstoy, the leader of the ruling United Russia party, has implored the men who are now putting their lives in danger to maintain Russian dignity to return home and find a transformed nation. "We are all aiming for a newly independent Russia," he declared, one free of Western influence. Last year, a "gay propaganda" law went into effect, making it illegal to advocate homosexual unions in any form.

Meanwhile, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko has said that Russia will create a new psychiatric hospital to research the mental health of homosexuals and those who struggle with gender roles and identity, among other things.

The Serbsky Center for Psychiatry and Narcology, according to the Health Ministry, will be the institution's cornerstone. Homosexual groups in Russia have slammed Murashko's remark, referring to it as "conversion therapy," a mix of physical and mental procedures used to address non-heterosexual tendencies and gender identity.