Ann Arbor, USA: Nuthatch update

Yesterday, our tree sitter was nearly killed by an on-site worker. More than ever, we need your support.

STATEMENT FROM NUTHATCH: On Tuesday night at 615 pm, well after normal work hours, a worker drove the tree cutter into the pines towards me and cut down several trees right next to mine. One of the trees he cut fell and hit my platform, barely missing me. I cannot describe to you the fear and terror I felt as the tree came towards me. I screamed and yelled to please, please stop, but I could barely hear myself over the sound of the saw. I could not even see the person inside, only a cold unfeeling machine. He didn’t stop. He kept coming again, again, and again as I begged for my life.
[Read More]

Swynnerton, UK: Update from Bluebell Woods Protection Camp

We are strong, we are not going anywhere and we are prepared to resist HS2 and their hired team of security thugs!

We still need YOU!

Here are ways you can support us at Bluebell and join the HS2 resistance!
[Read More]

Ann Arbor, USA: Tree-Sit Launched & Evicted

Report from Fight Concord Pines, on recent tree-sit that attempted to block the construction of a luxury housing development which would destroy a section of forest.

On Monday morning, a forest defender calling themselves Nuthatch climbed a pine tree on the site of the Concord Pines development at 660 Earhart Rd in Ann Arbor. They intend to live in the tree indefinitely in order to prevent it and other surrounding trees from removal at the hands of the developer. Supporters occupied the forest floor immediately around the tree to show solidarity with Nuthatch and their distaste for luxury housing construction in the midst of a climate and housing crisis. The sit is part of an ongoing campaign of actions beginning in late March, which together have successfully delayed work for at least 24 hours.
[Read More]

Groningen: Kraaienest court case, solidarity demonstration in Leeuwarden

Tuesday may 31st at 10:00 we will have our court case in Leeuwarden, Netherlands. We want to invite all our friends, fellow squatters, comrades and supporters to a demonstration in front of the court at Zaailand 102. After the court case we are organizing a concert night (punk, techno and more!) for our supporters and friends in Kraaienest. So extra reason for all the Randstad friends to travel to the north!

On january 28 we won our court case that was requested by Stichting Valquest. That was and is an important victory for the squatting movement! They now went into higher appeal, still for a speed eviction.
There is clearly no urgency to evict homeless young people who are trying to create an accessible social space in a gentrifying world. We know squatting is direct action against capitalist property values, and the courts protect those again and again. Is monetary value and real estate more important for them than improving lives in a concrete way? Still, in the Wet Kraken en Leegstand there is an attempt to prevent illegitimate vacancy, which would be the case in the Heerenhuis. Joshua Camera (under his strawman companies) wants to speculate to make even more money, like the logic of capitalism demands. We prefigure a world without exploitation and oppression. [Read More]

London: “Don’t worry, we’re autonomous”. Winter shelter evicted

Around 30 people have been evicted from an autonomously organised shelter in North London. At 9am on Thursday 7th April agents of the National Eviction Team and notorious eviction magnate Andrew Marsh, smashed their way through barricades to enforce a High Court writ despite repeated attempts by the occupiers to enter into dialogue with the property’s owners, OneHousing, to negotiate a peaceful and orderly handover.

The former St. Mungo’s hostel on Grey’s Inn Road has housed a community of vulnerable adults since it was squatted in December last year, including a woman six months pregnant with twins and many people who the care system has categorically failed to support through the winter. The eviction comes only days after the Severe Weather Emergency Protocol for London was activated, with freezing temperatures predicted for later in the week. There are no planning permission requests logged with Camden council for the property, and it will now most likely remain empty until its inevitable conversion into unaffordable housing. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Mokum Kraakt squats on the Kinkerstraat

Statement from Mokum Kraakt on 13 March 2022 after the squatting of Kinkerstraat 304 ground floor.

We are action group Mokum Kraakt. We are a mix of Hotel Mokum, Kinderen van Mokum and other squatters: young and old, experienced and new, but we’re all angry, full of love for Amsterdam and ready to fight for our city. Since 10th of march we are settled on Kinkerstraat, in one of the many empty shops in Amsterdam. Because Amsterdam belongs to its residents, not to big capital. We demand radical change. We demand accessible, livable and affordable housing. We demand a just and free city.

Underneath the clean and smooth streets, the city is collapsing. It’s almost invisible how the foundation of a lively city is beginning to burst under a layer of monoculture. In the cracks that Mokum Squats, spaces for counterculture are forming themselves. Spaces to experiment, to meet and to live. [Read More]

London: mansion occupied and evicted on Belgrave Square, owned by a russian oligarch

[update: all the squatters arrested on 15 march for occupying the house are been released on 16 march]

Russian Elite’s – You Occupy Ukraine, We Occupy You
We Are Anarchists. We Occupy this property in protest against Putin and his world. This mansion is owned by a Russian Oligarch (Oleg Deripaska), Complicit in Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

Do we need to remind you why Putin Sucks?
The invasion of Ukraine is only the latest episode in a long series, from the support of Assad in Syria to the neo-nazi Wanger militia assistanting dictatorship, concentration camps for LGBT+ people, ecosides, brutal wealth inequality, far right troll farms and so on.

By Occupying this mansion, We want to show solidarity for the people on Ukraine but also for the people of Russia who never agreed to this madness.
We want to show our sympathy to the brave protesters who have been in the belly of the beast, and suffer unjust imprisonment for staying up to Putin.

Finally a few words for the elites here in the UK, who have been Putins Minions for years. You received bribes, you managed Oligarch’s property, you even adopted Putin’s authoritarian attitude to protest and decent. FUCK YOU TOO. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Waldeck Pyrmontlaan 8 resquatted and a second time evicted

On Saturday 5 March, three houses, Waldeck Pyrmontlaan 8 (WP8) in Amsterdam, JC van Hattumweg 3 in Amstelveen, and the Red Door in Utrecht were announced as resquatted. WP8 was evicted a second time the same evening, with 9 arrests. Monday morning, JC van Hattumweg was back in the hands of the owner.
The 9 people arrested at WP8 will be taken to court on Wednesday. The public prosecutor wants their further detention for 14 days and the examining magistrate has to decide whether that’s appropriate. The hearings will not be public and no time is known. Autonomous soli actions are highly appreciated!

Statement from Autonomous Student Struggle – Waldeck Pyrmontlaan resquatted! 5 March 2022

3 days ago, we re-squatted the building on the Waldeck Pyrmontlaan in Amsterdam. Today we announce it publicly. We have been living here again since last Thursday. Today 3 buildings have been re-squatted. We stand in solidarity with our comrades from Elektra Flinta who re-squatted a building in Utrecht and our comrades from the Anarcha Feminist Group Amsterdam who re-squatted the squat in Amstelveen [1]. This action is a response to the evictions done by the police and to create a broader housing struggle. In the past we stated the importance of creating a culture of resistance, today we show that repression will be met with a collective response. For every eviction, new places will be squatted, evictions will be resisted. [Read More]

Wassenaar: Villa Ivicke eviction in 3 months – Let’s use this time well!

Wassenaar (Netherlands) – On Monday, we received the verdict in the interim measure court case against the notorious real estate speculator and owner of Ivicke, Ronnie van de Putte aka the Slum Lord, and the municipality of Wassenaar.

The judge denied our request to postpone our eviction until we’ve had a chance to appeal against the ruling of December’s court case. Despite claiming to recognize our interest in having a roof over our heads, and the lack of urgency of both the owner and the municipality to evict, the judge decided we have to leave Ivicke in 3 months.

This verdict is totally contradictory, and justified with reference to bullshit “theoretical” assumptions about the owner and municipality’s interests and intentions. [Read More]

Amstelveen: Last squatted house evicted

[Press release] Amstelveen (Netherlands) – Today, we, the group of people living at the Villa Aardappeleters (Potato Eaters), have left the house. After a legal battle of 6 years, we have chosen to respect the verdict of the Amsterdam court and to leave our home without a physical fight.

Villa Aardappeleters at the JC van Hattumweg 3 in Amstelveen would have been squatted for 19 years next month. In its 19 years of existence, the group had almost 30 inhabitants. Some of them lived here for more than 10 years, others for only a few months. Where one inhabitant consciously chose for the freedom and space that this special place offered, for others it was pure necessity, as, for example, for some undocumented persons who have lived here.

Although Villa Aardappeleters was a rather unknown squat, it has an infamous past. After the building was squatted in March 2003, the squatters found several weapons and explosives hidden in the attic during a party. [Read More]

Wassenaar: Possible Ivicke Eviction Within Two Weeks

Update on the hearing of the Provisional Ruling – 15 February 2022

Wassenaar (Netherlands) – Today, there was a hearing at the Raad van State in The Hague, which will decide the future of Huize Ivicke. The villa in Wassenaar that has been squatted for three and a half years is threatened with eviction because the building is officially designated as an office. In a court case on December 20th, the administrative judge in The Hague decided that vacancy was more appropriate than occupation, to which the residents have filed an appeal. To prevent an eviction before the date of the higher appeal, they have applied for a so-called preliminary injunction. This request was heard today by the Raad van State. The lawsuit is between the residents of Ivicke and the municipality of Wassenaar, with the latter wanting an immediate end of the occupation in violation of the zoning plan.

During the ruling on December 20th, the judge hardly considered the interests of the residents. In administrative law it has long been customary that little attention is paid to interests and results of decisions, but rather to the legal aspects of a case. As a result of the “toeslagenaffaire,” however, the Raad van State realised last year that the concrete consequences of their decisions are also somewhat important. [Read More]

Calais: “We will not let ourselves be taken away!”

Statement from Housing for All Calais

Since Friday 4 February, we have been occupying a building in Rue d’Ajaccio, which has been uninhabited for a year. This occupation took place within the framework of the commemoraction, an international day of mobilization initiated by the families and relatives of people who have died at the border, to denounce the murderous migration policies of the UK, France and the EU.

In Calais, about 1500 people are living on the streets in unacceptable living conditions. Displaced people occupy wastelands and have no access to basic services: housing, sanitation, water, food and medical care. The state imposes conditions of extreme precariousness and invisibility through illegal evictions every 48 hours, the theft of personal belongings by the police, the illegal dismantling of living sites without the possibility of defense in front of a judge, and recurrent police violence. The French and British governments, alongside Natacha Bouchard and all their other friends, have deliberately turned a political issue into a humanitarian crisis, keeping people who want to cross the border in a context of survival. [Read More]