Groningen: Kraaienest lives!

Groningen (Netherlands) – Kraaienest squat in Groningen lost the appeal and had to be out within three days. A quick end to a six-month period that was more than worth it. But we’ve only started.
Kraaienest at the Spilsluizen in Groningen has been evicted. On Tuesday morning, 5 July 2022, the verdict of the Arnhem-Leeuwarden Court in the appeal proceedings was announced. We had to leave within three days with the threat of a fine of 10,000 euros for every day we stayed (plus 4500 euros in legal costs). The reason was that Stichting Valquest had sold the property to the real estate company LMJD B.V. before we came to live there, even though the real estate company had not yet explicitly announced its concrete plans. He wanted to start renovating immediately, so that “there would be no more actual vacancy”. When we won the preliminary relief proceedings in January, the court in preliminary relief proceedings found that there was no urgent interest to evict, and that our living interests temporarily outweighed ours. Now a ruling has been given against this decision. What interests are we talking about? The only interest for the real estate speculators like Joshua Camera and all those other capitalists who would have a vested interest in this is to make money that they already have enough. That is not an interest, that is profiting on the backs of others. Our interests are our lives and the struggle for justice. This capitalist logic of property has almost put us on the street. We already knew that the courts protect private property, so we are not surprised. It does not make us any less angry. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Ceintuurbaan 39 squatted

RAAK (Radikale Anti Anti Kraak) had made a call out on Radar for a demonstration against gentrification in the Pijp in Amsterdam on saturday 9 july 2022.

In the wake of eviction of Ferdinand Boldstraat 14, a new ground floor was squatted on Ceintuurbaan 39. This old vitamin store was empty for 8 years and is around the corner from the Ferdinand Bolstraat.
In this building the give away shop will move from the Ferdinand Bolstraat and we will organize events, also together with the neighborhood.
The new squatted building was made public during the anti-gentrification demonstration in the Pijp. The participants of the demo moved the give away shop and free soup was handed out.

Squatting goes on, all the yuppies out of the Pijp! [Read More]

Amsterdam: demonstration against gentrification

Call out by the Radikale Anti Anti Kraak (R.A.A.K.) for a demonstration against gentrification on saturday 9 July 2022, 16:00, at Marie Heinekenplein in Amsterdam.

Gentrification does not just happen. It is a direct result of state policies and the system we live in: large corporations see potential to make money off a neighbourhood, and the state creates space for them to do this. Social housing gets sold and becomes private housing, more expensive stores are opened, and soon the original residents realize that they cannot afford to live in their neighbourhood anymore. More and more people with low income, especially people of colour and migrants, are forced to move to the outskirts of the city, and wealthier people take their place. Public spaces are no longer public but only affordable for people with high income. Gentrification does not solve poverty, but creates it, while moving it out of sight from wealthier people and tourists.

On the 13th of June, we squatted an abandoned building owned by the municipality in the Pijp, one of the most gentrified neighbourhoods in Amsterdam. Besides housing people, we are creating a much needed space that does not revolve around money. We are providing a place for people to relax, drink coffee and tea, or enjoy free food, as well as a free shop for people to bring and collect clothes, and a place to do laundry for those who cannot afford to wash it somewhere else. We are taking direct action against gentrification, rather than waiting for the municipality to solve the problems that their own policies helped to create. [Read More]

Susa Valley: new squatted shelter in Cesana-Torinese

In almost a year since the last eviction of the Casa Cantoniera in Claviere, we stayed here, in this valley, on this bloody and racist border, close to the people who challenge and overcome it every day, despite being forced to do so “illegally”: controlled, rejected and violated by the state and its armed forces. In the same valley where thousands of “migrants” with “the good papers”, called tourists, transit undisturbed. In the same valley where only in January this year the border killed two people, Fatallah Belhafif and Ullah Rezwan.

As of today, we return to organize in a place that has been abandoned for decades, which now belongs to nobody but lives thanks to the people who inhabit, build and self-manage it, in opposition to one and all states and laws that would like to repress any form of collective and individual autonomy. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Ferdinand Bolstraat 14 squatted

On the 13th of June we squatted a building on Ferdinand Bolstraat 14 ground floor. This house is owned by the municipality of Amsterdam and has been empty for over a year. We are a group of people in need for housing who found in squatting the only solution in order to live in Amsterdam. Houses stay empty for speculation, rent prices increase, council housing is sold of privately and the working class is being pushed out of the city. We decided to squat in de Pijp because it is a classic example of a beautiful neighborhood ruined by gentrification. We work in the city for minimum wage but like many other cannot afford to live here. We’re sick of exploitation, having our wages stolen from us while barely surviving. We’re sick of getting pushed to the outskirts while traveling to the pijp to serve food to yuppies in a neighborhood we cannot afford to live in. We will not stay quiet, we will not stay hidden. [Read More]

Athens (Greece): International day of action in defence of Exarchia neighborhood, 25 June 2022

25 June / Demonstration in Exarchia Square

The construction of the metro station on Exarchia square and the redevelopment of Strefi Hill are expected to start during the summer months, according to reports in the mainstream media, but also according to notifications by the Municipality of Athens to shops located in the square.

The government’s ultimatum is the final blow to the character of the historic neighborhood of Exarchia. The construction of a Metro stop on the square, the conversion of the Polytechnic school into a museum, the attempted eradication of the monument of Alexandros Grigoropoulos through the construction of luxury apartment buildings on Mesologgiou Street, the surrender of Strefi Hill to private interests (which includes the cementing of the park’s paths, cutting down trees, placing cameras, gates and security posts to control the entrance) are part of the overall designs for the gentrification of the area, the transformation of the neighborhood into a tourist destination, the development of control and repression. [Read More]

Seville: CSOA la Leona illegally evicted by force and without court order

After several months of collective work and some very intense weeks preparing the space, on Thursday May 19th it was finally time to make it public and open the space to anyone who wanted to get closer and get involved. Many people came to show their support and joy. There was finally a Self-Managed Squatted Social Center in Seville, after so many years.

We didn’t lose our cool when the police approached, as we were prepared to face the situation, with about a hundred people nearby, with the assembly well organised and united, including a mediator and a lawyer. We told the police that the building had been occupied by us for weeks, so they would need a court order to evict us, which they obviously didn’t have. [Read More]

Wassenaar: Ivicktion called off—but for how long?

Wassenaar (Netherlands) – On the 24th of May, Ivicke had a second “voorlopige voorziening” (VoVo)* hearing, to request a suspension of eviction until the higher appeal in our case against the municipality, who want to evict us on the grounds that according to the zoning plan our home should be an office.

We already had a first VoVo about this in February. That one we lost, but the judge gave us until the 28th of May before we had to leave. In the meantime, we actually won a civil court case against the owner, because the judge agreed that his plans for Ivicke are nonsense. Our lawyers then managed to get this new hearing because of that change of circumstances.

In the documents they submitted for this case, the municipality revealed that they already had the whole eviction planned for the 31st of May, coordinated with the cops and everything. With the added threat that, if they can’t evict then, the cops wouldn’t have time anymore before September because of the festival season, trying to pressure the judge into a fast ruling. Luckily, the judge started the case by making clear that they can get an eviction on the 31st out of their heads: he needs time for his decision, and he also recognises that we will need time to move if it’s negative. [Read More]

Amsterdam: house squatted at Amstelveenseweg 852

Since wednesday May 11 the house at Amstelveenseweg 852 is squatted. The owner of the house is “Werktrust Holding B.V.”, through the neighborhood we learned that their plan is to demolish this house to build 6 apartments. Despite the good condition of the building it has been empty for more than a year and will be demolished, most neighbors are against it and are engaged in an objection procedure.
Events will also be held here, keep an eye on the radar page of social center R.A.A.K. https://radar.squat.net/en/node/404448

R.A.A.K.
Amstelveenseweg 852
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
raak [at] riseup [dot] net
https://squ.at/r/8o2o [Read More]

Hambach Forest (Germany): Summer Event, 21-24 July 2022

FOREST ANTI-SPE DAYS #3
CHAOS AND RAGE, SMASH EVERY CAGE

BORDERLESS CALL: JOIN US IN THE HAMBACHER FOREST FOR A GATHERING FOR ANIMAL LIBERATION!

In the factory farms and vivisection labs, our nonhuman comrades are already fighting back. The time is ripe – let’s share skills and perspectives on how to support their resistance! By “anti-speciesism” we don’t mean online activism, vegan capitalism or cop-hugging pacifism – we’re opening a space to plot against human supremacism, and we’ve no need for bureaucratic organizations of any kind.

Many animal rights groups have become a hotbed for fascist/homophobic/cissexist/macho/white supremacist/colonialist views and behaviour. Others promote liberalism, the state or single out human activists as animal “saviours”. We want to build on two years of anti-spe days explicitly pushing against these tendencies, uncompromising in our rejection of all forms of oppression and domestication. Let’s meet each other and make some trouble! [Read More]

Amsterdam: R.A.A.K. New Social Center

New squatted social centre R.A.A.K. (Radikale Anti-Anti Kraak) opens its doors. Write an email to get involved or pass by to Douwes Dekkerstraat 18.

AIMS

We are openly anarchist and use methods that seek to built collective power against and alongside that of the state and capitalism. We want this space to be one that is welcoming,a space that encourages education and participation. We seek to strengthen and create bonds of solidarity to collectively support each other and fight back against that which oppresses us. Anyone who agrees with these aims and has a willingness to actively participate is welcome to help organise and run the space. We imagine and work towards a world in which everyone can truly be free, a world without hierarchy and oppression. [Read More]

Berlin: Køpiplatz resquatted. We are here to reclaim what is ours

This was not just a piece of land to us. It was our home, it was family, it was a our place to welcome people from all over the world, to learn and support each other, where we could grow and connect. In the most simple and wonderful way, it was our community and our life. But now our family have been split up; and more than anything we want to be back together.

6 months have passed since the bullshit eviction of Køpiplatz and some things still haven’t changed; the ground still stays empty, except a couple of hired goons to watch over it, but now it is filled with the wreckage of what was once our homes and lives.

The offer we received from the state and Howoge was not designed to support us, but rather a ‘Catch 22′ that would split us up in a variety of unacceptable ways, including an offer to remove 70 percent and leave a slither of land only able to accommodate a couple of trailers. These offers were refused. As a wagenplatz we are all or nothing and we are still a family despite now being forced apart and scattered across Berlin, and we are still searching for a place to be back together. [Read More]