Ljubljana: solidarity with Zizania and Ano Kato from the ruins of Mačjak

By: fawda - August 16th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

FROM THE CONCRETE THE SEEDS OF OUR SOLIDARITY WILL SPROUT 10-100-1000 NEW SQUATS

The claws of capital and gentrification are already seizing every last space in every city, settlement and piece of nature in the world. Every smallest environment is already polluted by the global system of exploitation. But the market-world keeps turning and big companies are still managing to gain profit through investments and sales, while because of their predation and lust for capital, we, the inhabitants of the world, are the ones facing natural disasters as a result of environmental destruction and global warming. [Read More]

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Ljubljana: Mačjak under eviction threat

By: fawda - July 31st, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

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]

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Ghent: Speculators building squatted in the Lange Steenstraat

By: fawda - July 27th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

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]

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Amstelveen: Halt to housing construction at Krakenburg

By: fawda - July 21st, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

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]

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Susa Valley: Passamontagna, camping against the borders

By: fawda - July 18th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

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]

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UK: From The Inbox. On Queer Housing

By: fawda - July 12th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

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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London: National Day of Housing, occupations at Southwark and Abbey Wood

By: fawda - July 11th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

On Saturday the 8th of July housing campaigns across the UK engaged in a series of decentralised actions under the slogan “Housing For Need Not Greed”. The actions of the Housing Rebellion, as it was called, were primarily focused around council estates facing the issue of “regeneration” (read: gentrification), but included neighbourhoods fighting their councils for green space, and putting the spotlight on the fact that the struggle for housing is inescapably tied to the issue of climate change.

Some of us, squatters from the local area, took part in the Southwark march that led us through the corpse of the Heygate Estate, now known as the beyond-hip Elephant Park, where we would be surprised to learn if any original resident of the estate has ever returned, or ever plans to. Southwark Notes has some great information on the displacement of residents despite promises of being able to return during initial consultations. 100 people marched, drums banging, voices raised, banners condemning the council and developers alike. Banners that went beyond a simple understanding of the situation of the Heygate or Aylesbury but to condemn a capitalist understanding of property and that hoped to spur into action those who see possibility beyond reform. In conjunction, the offices of Notting Hill Genesis were paintbombed and graffiti expressing righteous anger adorned the hoardings of the ongoing con(de)struction. [Read More]

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Amsterdam: Entertainment centre on Jan van Galenstraat squatted

By: fawda - July 10th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

We squatted Jan van Galenstraat 24, to prevent its demolition and to repurpose this building as a place for immediate housing and an autonomous social center.

The people that profit from capitalism enrich themselves in times of disaster. Right now we are in a housing crisis where people are forced to live on the street because the housing market is being used as a tool to exploit people and make private investors richer every day. The municipality and developers left a perfectly fine building empty for 7 years, and now they want to destroy the building to build unaffordable yuppie flats. This new neighborhood they want to build, the Marktkwartier, is going to be unaffordable for most and will drive up prices for the rest of the neighborhood. We are fed up with the municipality’s overly expensive housing plans for the city and want to actively fight against these bullshit gentrification projects that are based on wasting common resources for private profit. We need houses right now and we won’t rely on any government or investor to provide us with the bare minimum. we’re not gonna wait for affordable housing to magically appear. we take what we need, by squatting this building we instantly create a home and a space that benefits the neighborhood instead of tearing it apart. [Read More]

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Amsterdam: open call in solidarity with Villa Fuerte hearing

By: fawda - June 30th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

In 2010 the squatting ban was introduced. In theory, this law was created to criminalize squatting whilst fighting against houses being empty. In reality, its purpose was to please some politicians and their questionable neoliberal agenda. We see that there is no political will to fight emptiness, the local governments never put any effort into finding the owners that keep their houses empty. This law has only been used to evict squatters and make them homeless, while still many houses are left empty. In June 2022, another new law has been put into practice. It had as its goal to shorten the time span between the announcement of eviction and the moment of the actual eviction. By doing this they take away the rights of the squatters to legally defend themselves. Now after one year of this law existing in Amsterdam, we feel the repression. We are worried about how the hearings are going and how unjust their practice is. The way squatters are being evicted now is not through a court case but through a criminal hearing. The judge commissioner (RC) is the one to decide if the squatters will be evicted or not. To get all the information for the case, the RC invites the officer of justice who is an investigator cop, her name is Petra van Laeren. There is nobody to witness how these hearings go, it is not a public court case so no media or people interested in the case can be there. We, the squatters in Amsterdam, are starting to see that these hearings are a joke of justice. We figured out that there is a connection between the RC and the officer of justice, showing that they know each other better than just from the court. In the hearings, intimidation is going on, cops are waiting in front of the room to take pictures of the squatters. It is the same people taking the same decisions all the time behind closed doors and the decisions are not publicly posted. It is unfair that we have to blindly go to these hearings under their conditions. To not have an audience, no media, nothing is published. It is a blur of what goes on in these office rooms and how the decisions are being made. Justice is out of balance and we are mad about it. [Read More]

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Amsterdam: House squatted on Herengracht 377, Villa Fuerte blijft!

By: fawda - June 25th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

Cops came by during the reveal at Herengracht 377. The cops left but still want to come back for a speed eviction tomorrow. Support needed in coming days! After long hours of waiting in the heat, cops said they have legal grounds to speed-evict, but won’t do it because they didn’t have the capacity today (thanks to the people that showed up for support in front of the door). Neighbors said they didn’t see or heard the squatters these past few days, so police want to speed-evict for catching squatters red-handed, but the squatters showed them proofs that they had been staying for several days already. The cops don’t care and said they can come back anytime for speed eviction in the morning or during the day of the 26th. Stay alert and come when you can! Villa Fuerte needs to stay.

Statement Villa Fuerte

Today on Sunday the 25th of June, we announce that we have squatted this house on Herengracht 377 in Amsterdam. This place is owned by Ella Marina Nicolette Habsburg-Lothringen, member of a royal dynasty, who turned it into a Yoga center for her rich friends and that is now left empty. [Read More]

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London: Violent eviction of Autonomous Winter Shelter

By: fawda - June 10th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

Statement from the Autonomous Winter Shelter crew:

Following the violent eviction on 1st June 2023 by the Metropolitan Police, the Autonomous Winter Shelter collective, based in Shadwell, is taking a break from its public-facing activities after an incredibly busy seven months. We are all dealing with the consequences of this eviction differently, and some of us need time to recover both physically and mentally.

We are enormously grateful to everyone who was also a part of the project, supporting and defending it. There will be new, unseen opportunities to continue our work, and at the very least, to support people close to us, who we’ve met along the way. Everybody evicted has already been rehoused or found alternative accommodation. We need to keep showing up for each other when faced with the devastating consequences of inequality and injustice. As long as buildings lie empty and people require shelter, the need for all of us to take autonomy over our living situation will remain. [Read More]

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Amsterdam: Squatters Takland occupy adjacent building

By: fawda - June 5th, 2023  Filed under: Communique, News

Today we have expanded Takland. After we squatted the building at Taksteeg 8 on King’s Day – renamed Housing Day – today it is the turn of the adjacent building Taksteeg 6, which has also been vacant for years. Come and support Takland!

After declaring our independence from the state, they opened the hunt for us. The first time we saw them in court, we won. In doing so, we have ensured that red-handed is once again a means of struggle: the judge forbade eviction in the act if the police do not actually catch the squatter in the act. The second time we saw them in court, they punished us. The judge-commissioner, Eduard Messer, agreed with the owner. The judge and the officer are biased, feel contempt for the people in society hardest hit by the housing crisis, and don’t follow their own rules. Takland should be evicted by Thursday. But Takland is stronger than the state. Takland fights back. [Read More]

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