MOSCOW -- Efforts by police to punish a teenager for spreading so-called gay "propaganda" among minors in Russia's Bryansk Oblast have been halted.



Yelena Klimova, the leader of the Children-404 group, which defends the rights of gay teenagers, wrote on Facebook on February 6 that the decision has been reversed, apparently due to negative publicity.



The online news portal and television channel Znak.com said on February 2 that a probe had been launched against a ninth-grade girl in the Bryansk region in November after she openly announced her "nontraditional sexual orientation" to her classmates.



Znak.com published a copy of a special police commission's resolution recommending that she be punished.



The report sparked criticism of Russia's controversial law banning the "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations" among minors, which came into effect last summer.



Based on reporting by RFE/RL's Russian Service and grani.ru