In the Russian city of St. Petersburg, a memorial to Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs was dismantled after Tim Cook, the man that succeed Jobs at the helm of the multi-billion dollar computer manufacturing company, came out as gay.

Jobs, who died in 2011, was not gay, the New York Post noted.

Designed in the shape of an iPhone, the 2-meter-high monument (6-foot-6-inch) was erected by a Russian corporation under the Western European Financial Union (ZEFS) in January 2013 just outside a St. Petersburg college.

NBC News reports that a press release by ZEFS accuses the reigning Apple CEO of "promoting homosexuality" to minors. The union took the down, citing the need to abide by a law combating "gay propaganda."

"In Russia, gay propaganda and other sexual perversions among minors are prohibited by law. ... [The momnument was] in an area of direct access for young students and scholars," the ZEFS press release reads. "After Apple CEO Tim Cook publicly called for sodomy, the monument was taken down to abide to the Russian federal law protecting children from information promoting denial of traditional family values."

On Oct. 30, Cook penned in an 800-word editorial posted on Bloomberg Businessweek, that sent the Internet buzzing. A day after, the memorial was removed.

"Being gay has given me a deeper understanding of what it means to be in the minority and provided a window into the challenges that people in other minority groups deal with every day. It's made me more empathetic, which has led to a richer life. It's been tough and uncomfortable at times, but it has given me the confidence to be myself, to follow my own path, and to rise above adversity and bigotry," Cook wrote. "It's also given me the skin of a rhinoceros, which comes in handy when you're the CEO of Apple."

This also happens to be on the heels of another controversy aimed at Cook, when Vitaly Milonov -- an anti-LGBT lawmaker behind a law signed by Putin and a politician based in St. Petersburg -- spoke to FlashNord about Russia banning Cook from the country, according to a translation by Huffington Post.

"What can he bring us? The Ebola virus, AIDS, gonorrhea? All of them over there have promiscuous relations. Ban him forever," Milonov said.

Milonov co-authored a "homosexual propaganda" bill in St. Petersburg, which later influenced the passage of a similar law: In 2013, Russian president Vladimir Putin signed into legislation a bill that "criminalizes the propaganda of homosexuality among minors," according to Huffington Post.

At the time of the passage of that bill, public outcry spread throughout the West in the days that preceded the Winter Olympics in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, where Putin hosted in February.

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