On September 25, 2005, Pretoriusstraat 43 was squatted by the Amsterdam-Oost squatting group as a protest against long-term vacancy, criminal money laundering practices and real estate speculation.
For 18 years the house has been a place for a living group on the upper floors, and in 2008, after 3 years of residence and the eviction of Pretoriusstraat 28, Joe’s Garage moved to the Pretoriusstraat 43 ground floor.
The Amsterdam-Oost squatting group has now been present in the Pretoriusstraat for more than 20 years. Joe’s Garage is a political / social center, run by a broad volunteer collective. Independent, in solidarity and non-profit. A place where the ‘cold wind from the market’ does not blow, a meeting place for many.
Joe’s is also 18 years old, with more than 1800 (people’s) kitchens (Voku’s), more than 1000 openings of the give-away shop, countless film evenings, music performances, language cafes, the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and of course, every Tuesday evening for 18 years, the housing / squatting assistance hour (KSU Oost) for help & info. [Read More]
Amsterdam: 18 years Pretoriusstraat 43 and Joe’s Garage
Briançon: come to support the new squat
A squat opened in Briançon (France) on Monday, August 7: the Pado, to meet a need for accommodation in the Briançonnais; The institutional and associative structures are currently more than full. We have the idea and the hope to be able to offer a new place of residence for undocumented people, in more livable conditions, because the building is large and made to accommodate many people. For the moment we have neither water nor electricity because they were illegally cut off during a costly action carried out by the council, the national police and the electricity company EDSB, aimed at destroying the electrical infrastructure upstream of the building. They chose to make the building unlivable rather than evict us, forcing us to live in precarious conditions to abandon this place.
We reaffirm the relevance of initiatives outside the institutional or associative framework, as they are too narrow to respond to the scale and complexity of the situation. [Read More]
Montreuil: La Baudrière evicted
This morning, Tuesday, August 22, 2023, at 6am in Montreuil (France), took place the eviction of La Baudrière, anarcha-feminist squat. This place was, since November 2021, a space of habitation, political organization and care, which has seen many people pass by and hosted many struggles. La Baudrière defended itself with confetti and barricades to resist as long as possible, to continue to keep alive the feminist queer autonomy. The people on site held for 5 hours to the assaults of the cops, especially on the roof.
Police resources used were astonishing: more than 100 cops on site, including the Brav-M, the BAC, the BRI, a climbers unit, a private security group, a fire truck, Enedis technicians, 3 drones… The neighborhood was completely cordoned off for half a day. [Read More]
Groningen: No Border Camp 2023 started
Week of actions and workshops against repressive border and migration policies
Groningen (Netherlands), 21 August 2022 – This morning the No Border Camp 2023 has started at the terrain between Paddepoelsterweg 14 and 16 in Groningen. Over the coming week, hundreds of international activists will gather for actions, meetings, workshops, discussion and culture in the context of the struggle for a world without borders and freedom of movement for all.
It is no coincidence that this year’s No Border Camp is taking place in the north of the Netherlands, where only a year ago Ter Apel became the face of the failing migration policy. The border policy not only causes tragedy far from the Netherlands, such as the recent shipping disaster off the Greek coast, the consequences are also visible here. Everyone in the Netherlands remembers the images of the hundreds of people who had to spend the night in front of the gate of the registration centre in Ter Apel. Other degrading situations are taking place in the emergency shelters in the area and the rest of the country. [Read More]
Utrecht: Croeselaan squatted. We do not accept temporary rentals!
On the 13th of august around 13:00, 4 houses have been squatted on the Croeselaan in Utrecht (Netherlands) where the municipality decided on destroying a lot of houses to make space for a fancy park and an office building. To do this they let around 12 to 13 houses stand empty for months now. While GroenLinks was part of the organisers of the last Woonprotest in Utrecht they also had the deciding vote for destroying these houses. During the housingprotest the houses were occupied and about an hour later housepeace was declared. A big thank you to the people who came out and supported the new squats!
Statement from Croeselaan squatters on Saturday 19 august 2023: We do not accept temporary rentals! [Read More]
Montreuil: La Baudrière under eviction threat from august 21st
Why defend La Baudrière
La Baudrière is an anarcha-feminist queer* squat that opened in November 2021 in Montreuil (a city located in Paris’ suburbs). A lot of people meet here, they come for a few hours, a few days or a few weeks. They came there to live, to learn, to party, to organize. La Baudrière is full of their memories.
Now, eviction is looming, and for us, who use this place in so many different ways, it is time for us to defend this space.
We are calling any non-cis het men to colelctively defend La Baudrière, from the 21st of August onwards.
Here are some of the reasons why we want to resist. Down with the landlords and the evictors, down with the gentrifiers ! [Read More]
Florence: Corsica social centre eviction in progress. Resistance on the roof, solidarity rally in the street.
In Florence eviction in progress of the squat “Viale Corsica 81”, living space and anarchist social center.
At dawn, the Digos executed the preventive seizure of the occupied property on Ponte di Mezzo Street. The neighborhood is filled with riot cops, soldiers of the Guardia di Finanza and carabinieri. Corsica 81, squatted in 2012, was evicted last year from the homonymous street, then reopened at 32 Ponte di Mezzo street where today the new police eviction took place and which is not yet finished: two people are actually on the roof, the solidarity rally in the street was violently pushed back by the police in riot gear. The resistance, however, continues: at 5 p.m., gathering in the nearby gardens of Via Mariti in Florence. [Read More]
Ljubljana: Mačjak under eviction threat
Statement released on 31st of july by Mačjak, the squatted anarcha-queer space in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Eviction festival to take place on 15th of august 2023:
After little more than a year of constructing, organizing and maintaining the space known as Mačjak we are faced with an eviction notice coming into effect on the 1st of august.
Mačjak was always imagined as a temporary place for the anarcha-queer community here in Ljubljana to explore its means and desires. It was our chance to try squatting for the first time, after a 16-year void of political occupations in our city. Most of us who started the project were evicted in january 2021 from Autonomous Factory ROG (squatted in 2006) and moved into a shared space A-infoshop (built in 2003) in Metelkova (squatted in 1993). We needed to see what we can do by ourselves and what we really want for ourselves – what we first wanted was a small garage to host our our political art projects, but this initial space was in fact already occupied by homeless sleepers. So we took a part of a small building, it was trashed. One couldn’t even see the floor, let alone lay on them. we figured this was a nice place. There was no access to electricity, but we managed to open the water. The first summer we swept the walls off the floor and filled in the holes where electricity cables had been ripped out. We fixed the doors. It quickly became a place to spend time in, and we invited other groups to meet here. it soon became a place where we could work and party, where we could feel safe even though the place got attacked a few times. It became a place where we could build our community and nurture the anarcha resistance. [Read More]
Ghent: Speculators building squatted in the Lange Steenstraat
Since July the 12th, the building in the Lange Steenstraat 6 is back in use. We, a group of young and socially engaged people, have moved in.
In many places in Ghent there are empty buildings. At the same time, there is a housing crisis: high and rising rents, unaffordable housing. By using the building, we avoid the deterioration of the building and we have a roof over our heads.
We stay in the property to no longer be on the street and by taking care the building, we also take care care for others. The building will be a temporary cultural centre. We will organize activities such as: people’s kitchens, movie nights, exhibitions, open space for circus and theater… [Read More]
Amstelveen: Halt to housing construction at Krakenburg
News! A line has definitely been drawn through the 4,000 houses that were to be built on the 2.3 hectares of Krakenburg, at Laan van Kronenburg 12 in Amstelveen.
Despite the extreme housing shortage, the Ministry of Infrastructure thinks that these houses “can be built elsewhere”, and Schiphol gets all the space it needs to continue polluting.
People are now sleeping on the streets, and many are struggling to pay sky-high rents, especially in times of increasing gentrification. We refuse to wait for slow bureaucracy and so-called “solutions” from above.
Therefore, 2 months ago we took the law into our own hands, and instead of more years of no housing, the piece of land is now being actively occupied. With this open space, we want to show that things really can be different. We want to be there for the neighborhood, to share and to show that you can create many things with few resources, and we also want to prove that you can live with nature instead of against it. [Read More]
Susa Valley: Passamontagna, camping against the borders
4-5-6 August 2023, travelling NoBorder Camp in Susa Valley, Italy https://squ.at/r/9jj2
Place: Susa Valley – Claviere (ITA) – Briancon (FR)
Three days of traversing the mountains together for a world without borders and authoritarianism!
Three days of encounters, discussions and reflection.
Three days of collective struggle and solidarity.
The Border Machinery
The policies of the European Union and its member states continue to make it deadlier to reach Fortress Europe. Both at sea and in transit countries such as Turkey, Libia and now Tunisia, death is the currency being dealt to those seeking out a better life. The border is enforced internally and externally; having shifted as far south as the Sahel and as far east as Kurdistan.
The Frontex budget is exploding, having risen from €93 Million to €845 million (2023) in just ten years. In the same time frame, the length of EU border fences have grown from 315 km to 2048 km. Novel technologies and intense militarization of the borders have kept arms & technology producers’ profits soaring. Those who manage to reach the shores of Europe are kept in servitude, picking the fruit and vegetables for discounters and slaving away in the factories and brothels. They are promised a shot at climbing the ladder, kept as human capital in the service of the economy with the hopes of achieving the golden ticket; asylum or even residence. [Read More]
UK: From The Inbox. On Queer Housing
Articulating these ideas began as a rant about why building houses in middle-of-nowhere-green-space is fucking stupid. The UK has a privatised, unreliable, unaffordable and inaccessible public transport system and a road network that spits on pedestrians, cyclists and anyone not on four wheels. Its bad for people and for planet, but profiteering companies will build “homes” regardless of the inaccessibility of their locations and the impact they have on the pre-existing environment. They’ll board up and tear down flats in already urbanised areas, tell us there’s not enough homes and get a fat cheque from the state to build some wanky new ones. Their justification for urban sprawl and natures receding tree line is that there aren’t enough homes.
We have spent several long years protesting against new roads and HS2, with some downtime getting particularly angry about housing developments. And it seems we aren’t the only people with fire in our bellies! We are inspired by the resistance Generation Rent has shown landlords throughout the pandemic, by the resilience of fellow squatters, by boaters fighting the CRT’s boat cull, and by folks organising under the Housing Rebellion banner. We are just beginning to have the words to describe how big the housing crisis is, and how our experiences as queers and as squatters can inform the radical solutions we need. [Read More]
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