Athens: Statement by the Koukaki Squat Community

By: fawda - December 19th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

We may have fallen, but we’ve fallen on their heads.

Statement of the squatters and comrades who defended Matrozou 45 and escaped from the MAT, OPKE, and EKAM police forces of repression. While facing a police raid, we were informed to the fate of the other houses in our squatted community.

We immediately barricaded the house and entered conflict with the forces of repression. Furniture, electrical appliances, boilers, paint, fire extinguishers, everything and anything in the house fell upon their heads. They responded by shooting and injuring us with plastic bullets as well as with stun grenades thrown directly into our home. We shouted “Here we live, here is our home, here we will die!”—”Fuck your development and Airbnb.” [Read More]

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Athens: Solidarity call with the Koukaki Squat Community

By: fawda - December 19th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

The state’s spectacular repression made another show this morning with the eviction of three living spaces, squats of housing and struggle, those of the Koukaki Squat Community (*). Armed to the teeth state guards, using all their gadgets, broke down doors, shot tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets into the houses and the bodies of those living inside, in order to “return the buildings to their rightful owners”, in other words, to the desert of private ownership and capitalism. During the operation, they even tortured and arrested neighbours who dared question their all mightiness.

The message carried out by the bastard torturers and murderers, those bodyguards of fat cats and their politicians, was one of sweeping state terrorism against the social body.

The Koukaki squat community 3 years ago, opened up a space that kept growing, for the needs of the struggle for social self organization, against capitalist and state oppression. The community has defended its ground combatively whenever this was called for. This morning’s battle returned a bit of the violence to its institutional beares, proving in deed that the only lost battle is the one not fought for. [Read More]

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Finland: New squat Kattila under threat of eviction

By: fawda - December 15th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

A small, cozy wooden house was squatted on 13 December in kivihaka, Helsinki, Finland on the corner of roads Hämeenlinnanväylä (E12) and Hakamäentie.

We all need space to live and be in. Space to sleep, cook, meet each other, perform mutual projects, study and develop ourselves, organize events, create new and to have fun. These kinds of spaces are not distributed fairly in hierarchically organized society. When some let their “owned” buildings sit empty, others are without communal spaces or even homes. Besides this, there are numerous places that are not safe if you’re something else than a white cis-hetero male or even open at all for poor people. This feels unfair and pisses us off. Something must be done! [Read More]

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Serbia: Update from Šid

By: sisulscz - December 15th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

In Šid, Serbia, we are currently experiencing the gradual return of migrants after the recent eviction of squats throughout town. Police had forcibly brought people living inside the squats to far away camps close to the Romanian and Bulgarian borders. This resulted in a major set back for them on their way to the EU. However, there also are new faces among those coming to Šid.

During the eviction, many of the guys had their telephones, money and other personal belongings taken away by police. Tents that were sheltering over a hundred people prior to the eviction were destroyed, as well as all the blankets keeping these same people warm at night.
[Read More]

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Ronzón (Spanish State): Social center El Palaciu under threat

By: fawda - December 13th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

The social center El Palaciu of Ronzón, Asturias, which was squatted last April is facing threat of eviction.
The mansion which houses the social center is owned by the Fundacion de Ronzón. They are the inheritors of Spain’s feudal system. They have extensive land holdings in and around Ronzón. As this includes all the houses of the families living in Ronzón, they also are the landlords to the entire local community. Charged by the conditions of the trust with developing the countryside, their only action of note has been to undermine the Palace by profiting from the unwanted, unfinished AVE high speed train. Oh, they also profited from a duck farm scam.
Our vision of the countryside is different. If they are the continuation of feudal oppression, we are the continuation of peasant resistance. The rent seeking of the Fundacion and their ilk has led to the abandonment of over 800 villages in the Asturian countryside. The bureaucrats in rural town halls dream vapid dreams of wealthy city dwellers spending their excess capital in an uninhabited, natural paradise. We live and breathe and work for a sustainable, thriving agrarian world; a world where the necessities of life, like land and housing, are held in common for the empowerment of all. [Read More]

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Seattle: Autonomous Tiny Home Village Pushes Back Eviction to March 2020

By: sisulscz - December 10th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

Report from Stop the Sweeps and Demand Utopida Seattle on the recent pushing back of an eviction of an autonomous self-organized tiny house village.

Seattle Deputy Mayor Mosley has promised that the village will not be swept and may remain on the current site through March 2020. The City has secured a commitment from the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) that they will not try to remove the houses, which they claim to own. He expressed some concerns about whether the budget outlined by the village will be adequate, wants the village to commit to allowing case managers to work with residents, and says there are some other details to be worked out, but it is a relief to everyone to have this overview agreed upon. The residents will now be responsible for coming up with the funds to cover utilities and other operating costs which are estimated to be $27,000 through March 2020. If you are so inclined to donate, please follow this link here.
[Read More]

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Athens: From Theory to Practice – An Initial Response – 15 buildings liberated

By: sisulscz - December 6th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

The entire state machinery of the Mitsotakis government, spearheaded by its repressive forces, is opposed to anything that challenges its impositions of normality. It uses the doctrine of “law and order” and the rhetoric of zero tolerance as a veil to cover and distract from its endless inconsistencies. It feeds its constituents the rhetoric of nation, security, legitimacy, and development while adopting models of polarization and paradigms of bygone eras. The purpose is clear: the attempted eradication of the structures of struggle and the destruction of the revolutionary movement, which stands against its development plans and any model of so-called urban gentrification. At the same time, there is a systematic effort to massively displace populations that do not “fit” into the increasing needs of capital and the bosses of the metropolis. The effort to create an ideal consumer environment of both a passive and easily controlled population that serves the private interest is high on their agenda. On the one hand, airbnb, entertainment hotspots, shop windows, and hotels aim at the spectacle-ization of neighborhoods and the profitability of the few, while, on the other hand, cameras, drones, enforcement of all kinds, and the ceding of control of every [public and private] space to the police state for consumer control, surveillance, and commerce.
[Read More]

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Puget Sound: Stop the Sweeps!

By: sisulscz - December 6th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

Don’t Let Your Houseless Neighbors Be Treated Like Garbage

Flyer for printing stopthesweepsflyer

Thousands of people sleep-rough in tents, doorways, or vehicles around the Puget Sound. On any given day they might be forced to give up what little semblance of stability they have by threat of violent arrest and seizure of their few belongings. These sweeps are a never-ending game of whack-a-mole where the only result is to keep the problem out of sight and out of mind, all while inflicting ever-more violence and trauma on those already suffering.

As an avalanche of tech capital pours into the region, more are forced out of their homes and onto the streets every day. This displacement often falls along historic lines of racist and colonial segregation: Indigenous, Black and Brown communities are significantly more likely to be forced out by gentrification and find themselves with nowhere else to go. A nationwide drug epidemic, fueled by massively profitable pharmaceutical companies, magnifies the problems homeless folks already face.
[Read More]

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Athens: Call for demos on 5th and 6th of December

By: sisulscz - December 5th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

Athens. On Thursday 5th December,the Ministry of Public Order’s deadline to “remove squatters” from their homes expires. On this day, we are calling on everyone to protest against the repression, not recognizing any decision of the state or ultimatum of the Ministry of Public Order. On Friday the 6th of December we also march in memory of the 2008 uprising for the murder of Alexis Grigoropoulos.

[Read More]

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Northern Serbia: Large-scale police operation sweeps refugee squats

By: sisulscz - November 28th, 2019  Filed under: Communique

The largest eviction of people was carried out at the settlement in the former Grafosrem industrial facility, but was accompanied by the clearance of multiple other smaller squats throughout the city of Šid / The Deputy Head of the Municipality of Šid, Mr Zoran Semenović was also in attendance, declaring the abandoned factory site to be his property, loudly insulting NNK volunteers that were present and — together with police — removing these witnesses from the area
[Read More]

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Athens (Greece): Notara26 issues ultimatum to Greek government

By: fawda - November 24th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

Notara 26 issues ultimatum to Greek government, answering back to the government’s ultimatum to evacuate all squats within 15 days.

From occupied Exarchia we give a 15 days deadline to resign tho all those who dream of the revival of the dictatorship along with their propaganda mechanisms, through beatings, virtual rapes, stripping of women, denial of legal rights, intimidations and surveillance of comrades, workers and students. These are only some of the practices of the increasing repression and onslaught towards the people’s struggle. Their excellence and normality consists of closed borders, closed camps, closed minds and then the smokestacks will follow.
We have been given a 15day deadline. 15 days…
Notara 26 has existed for 1500 days. It has sheltered more than 9000 people from 15 different countries of origin. Hundreds of solidarians from all over the planet have participated in the project. Thousands of different stories. One constant common struggle for solidarity, selforganisation of our lives, acceptance of difference and uniqueness. One struggle in our squat, our neighborhood, the street.

Ideas cannot be supressed. Notara 26 is here and will stay alive !
You cannot evict a movement. Not now, not ever ! [Read More]

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Athens (Greece): About the eviction of Bouboulinas 42

By: fawda - November 18th, 2019  Filed under: Communique, News

On May 2019, Bouboulinas 42 squat began as an answer to the operation of the state (governed by SYRIZA) to evict a series of squats, mostly migrant housing ones and throw hundreds of migrants to the streets or transfer them to concentration camps. It was an answer that came from occupied Gini, which said “we, locals, migrants, solidarians, squatters, realize that our answer must be given in common. That is why we decided to occupy the building of Gini in Polytechnio, as an immediate response to the evictions and to organize the resistance against the repression, the defense of the squats, the neighborhood and our lives.”

From then until its eviction, Bouboulinas squat became the house for hundreds of people that are constantly prosecuted, incarcerated and tortured by the Greek state. The same people who are stripped off of any right to exist, are stigmatized as criminals and scum by the media and a national body hungry for human meat and a cheap labor force. Bouboulinas 42 squat was and is the realization of the desire for a better life and the struggle for freedom and equality beyond nations, religions and gender differences. [Read More]

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