Amsterdam: Eviction letter Kerkstraat 104

Today, just after the eviction of the Pieter Vlamingstraat 98, the squatted building on Kerkstraat 104 got the 8 weeks eviction letter.
The house was squatted on the 7th of December, and according to the letter it will be evicted before the 18th of March.
Will there be an eviction wave, as Van der Laan wishes to re-establish it?
If other houses got eviction letters for the same period, please let us know.
Rebel, resist, revolt! [Read More]

Amsterdam: Pieter Vlamingstraat 98 resists eviction

Today, Friday the 16th, the building is not yet evicted.

The buildings on the Pieter Vlamingstraat 94-96-98 had been empty since 2008, when the tenants were kicked out. The demolition of these and other surrounding buildings started in 2009 with the exception of Pieter Vlamingstraat 98, where the owner of the coffeshop on the ground floor refused to leave. The original plan of De Key was to demolish the existing social houses for building luxury apartments for the free market. The neighbors protested against the plan, started a court-case and the project was eventually rejected. De Key then proposed to build both social and private sector apartments, but this was rejected as well. Eventually De Key proposed to build 145 apartments for students, and the projects got finally approved despite the opposition of the neighbors, who started yet another court case against De Key but lost it at the end of 2014.

In July 2012 a group of people squatted the Pieter Vlamingstraat 98 and the empty field that was left after the demolition of the buildings aside. These fields are quite common in Amsterdam Oost, where housing corporations like De Key, after demolishing entire social housing blocks, run out of money to complete the project and left only waste lands behind. At the time of the occupation, the state of the house was very poor. All the basic infrastructures were missing, and the structure of the building was rotting away. The squatters massively renovated the building to make it livable. Through these years more then 30 people have called this building ‘home’. A lively communally grew around it, and started a number of activities for the neighborhood such as a neighborhood garden (Roomtuintje Oostbos), a give away shop and a free library. [Read More]

Eviction Delayed Again: The Expropriated Bank, Barcelona

The ‘Expropriated Bank’ is one of 7 occupied social centers in  ex banks in and around Barcelona.  Though long overdue for eviction the State has hesitated, perhaps a bit nervous after failing to evict Can Vies last year due to huge solidarity.

Maybe they don’t want to coincide with widespread public anger at the jailing of 7 activists for being anarchists.  (Mass Demos vs. Gag law and Arrest of Anarchists)

Perhaps they wish to avoid more opposition to their corrupt banks which have presided over the eviction of up to half a million people to balance their crooked books.

Whatever the reason the ‘Expropriated Bank’ in Gracia barrio is still going strong. Here’s a translation of their latest communiqué…..

[Read More]

Berlin: Solidarity sabotage with those incarcerated as part of Operation Pandora in Spain

As a sign of our solidarity with projects raided on December 16th, 2014, in Barcelona and in other cities as well as the comrades detained in the course of Operation Pandora, we burnt a vehicle of DHL in the early hours of January 5th, 2015, in the neighbourhood of Neukölln in Berlin.

DHL was attacked not only for their collaboration with the army, but also for the reason of international distribution of vehicles of this company, which constitutes an appropriate target for sabotage actions. [Read More]

Spain: Words written a few months ago by some of the Operation Pandora prisoners

SOLIDARITY AND STRUGGLE

For those who struggle, solidarity is not an empty concept, distant from our offensive capacity and the conflicts that develop in the struggle itself.

For those who struggle, solidarity is not an “issue” that emerges only at particular repressive “moments”, because repression is not a “moment”, it’s an otherwise inevitable and permanent part of the state’s mechanisms against those who rebel. [Read More]

Roybon, France: Communique from the MaquiZAD – on the recent roadblock

It’s now more than one month since the occupation of the Forest House, and that the cabins replace the massively destructive machines in the forest. We are here, and good here.

In spite of the cold and the snow, in spite of the pressure exerted by the gendarmerie[1], in spite of the various attacks that we have suffered, in spite of the frequent sabotages of structures, life goes on at the Maquizad.

[Read More]

Spanish State: Security is not a crime, Riseup.net statement after Pandora operation

On Tuesday December 16th, a large police operation took place in the Spanish State. Fourteen houses and social centers were raided in Barcelona, Sabadell, Manresa, and Madrid. Books, leaflets, computers were seized and eleven people were arrested and sent to the Audiencia Nacional, a special court handling issues of “national interest”, in Madrid. They are accused of incorporation, promotion, management, and membership of a terrorist organisation. However, lawyers for the defence denounce a lack of transparency, saying that their clients have had to make statements without knowing what they are accused of. “[They] speak of terrorism without specifying concrete criminal acts, or concrete individualized facts attributed to each of them” 2. When challenged on this, Judge Bermúdez responded: “I am not investigating specific acts, I am investigating the organization, and the threat they might pose in the future” 1; making this yet another case of apparently preventative arrests.

Four of the detainees have been released, but seven have been jailed pending trial. The reasons given by the judge for their continued detention include the posession of certain books, “the production of publications and forms of communication”, and the fact that the defendants “used emails with extreme security measures, such as the RISE UP server” 2.

We reject this Kafka-esque criminalization of social movements, and the ludicrous and extremely alarming implication that protecting one’s internet privacy is tantamount to terrorism.

Riseup, like any other email provider, has an obligation to protect the privacy of its users. Many of the “extreme security measures” used by Riseup are common best practices for online security and are also used by providers such as hotmail, GMail or Facebook. However, unlike these providers, Riseup is not willing to allow illegal backdoors or sell our users’ data to third parties.
[Read More]

Canary Islands: Sabotage & painted slogans in solidarity with the prisoners of Operation Pandora

[Other Pandora solidarity actions in Leipzig, Barcelona, Lisbon, Paris and San Francisco]

In support of our anarchist and feminist compañeras detained recently as part of the so-called “Pandora case”, and making clear our revulsion at this murderous capitalist and heteropatriarchal system, on the 30th of December 2014 from the colony of the Canary Islands we carried out actions of sabotage against ATMs and painted some graffiti in solidarity with the accused. [Read More]

Leipzig: Deutsche Bank stoned in solidarity with anarchists arrested in Operation Pandora

In solidarity with anarchists arrested in Spain, we wrecked the Deutsche Bank branch in Leipzig.

On the 16th December 2014 in Spain, different police forces conducted coordinated raids in 12 apartments, resulting in 11 anarchists arrested. One of the pretexts for why the raids took place was that the accused had destroyed cashpoints. [Read More]

Barcelona: Reportback from demonstration in solidarity with those detained in Operation Pandora

[Other recent solidarity actions in Lisbon, Paris and San Francisco]

On Saturday, December 27th, 2014, at 5pm, demonstrators took to the streets in the city centre of Barcelona in solidarity with anarchists detained in the context of Operation Pandora at the request of Judge-executioner Javier Gómez Bermúdez.

Protesters started to march on broad streets, shouting slogans in solidarity with the detainees, and against the police, prisons and the State. The demonstration ended up in the Gracia area. Upon entering this neighbourhood, hooded comrades uninhibitedly attacked many bank branches, several multinational shops, as well as the 5-star Casa Fuster hotel (which was the Nazi Germany’s consulate in Barcelona in 1936, prior to being the headquarters of the revolution’s defense committee in the spring of 1937, until it was taken by the Falange in 1939, and became a luxury hotel during the Transition, after the associative neighbourhood movement attempted to turn it into social facilities). [Read More]

London: Love Activists Press Release


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: The Thin Scrooge Line — How police, bailiffs, the high court and a mysterious shell company conspired to steal Christmas Dinner from the homeless.

--- PRESS RELEASE on behalf of autonomous solidarity for Love Activists, London. BEGINS ---

‘Twas the night before Christmas, in the High Court of the land,
Where Justice was guided by the invisible hand…
While some with full bellies were nestled in bed;
The homeless and hungry had hopes to be fed….

[Read More]

Prague: Autonomous centre Klinika calls for support!

klinika_Jeseniova_60_praha_3As we already informed you in previous article, the squatted autonomous centre Klinika (situated in former clinic owned by state, now in decay and without any real plans how to revive it) in Prague was evicted on 9th of December, despite having support from neighbourhood, people from wider cultural scene and even from council of local municipality, Žižkov. The struggle continues and Klinika needs any kind of support more than before.

While there still were (and still are) some kind of negotiations going on between delegates from Klinika and various state and city organizations, a solidarity happening took place in Prague on Saturday 13th of December. Up to thousand people joined and walked through the neighbourhood in a possitive mood. After the march was finished in front of Klinika, a group of attendees occupied the house for a few minutes, but after they were persuaded by so-called “Anti-conflict team” of the police, they left without any force being used on them. However, the police used this issue as an excuse to displace people from public spaces around the house in quite a brutal way – the organizer of demo was beaten down for no obvious reason, people were pushed to fall down the hill, two ended up in hospital… [Read More]