London: Location for London FreeSchool Announced…

The London FreeSchool began occupying 161 Commercial Street. There will be various workshops and discussions held there over this weekend on ‘Squatting, Housing & Gentrification’. The event begins at 10am Friday 19th June so feel free to pop in anytime from then onwards. For more information see the website http://londonfreeschool.wordpress.com

The building can be found at 161 Commercial Street, E1 2DA, near the Shoreditch High Street junction. Nearest tube station Liverpool Street. Buses 8, 26, 35, 42, 47, 48, 67, 78, 135, 149, 242, 344, 388.

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Palestine: 13th july 2009, international day of actions against house evictions and demolitions

INTERNATIONAL DAY OF ACTIONS AGAINST HOUSE EVICTIONS AND DEMOLITIONS IN PALESTINE – MONDAY 13TH JULY 2009

THE COMMUNITY OF SHEIKH JARRAH CALLS FOR INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT

SET UP TENTS OUTSIDE ISRAELI EMBASSIES WORLDWIDE IN SOLIDARITY WITH NEIGHBOURHOODS OF OCCUPIED EAST JERUSALEM

Tents have become a powerful symbol of the struggle of Palestinian people living in occupied East Jerusalem. They have been set up as centres of protest in neighbourhoods threatened by numerous eviction and demolition orders, part of Israel’s wider policy to ethnically cleanse Jerusalem of its Palestinian population.
Ultimately this would destroy any hope of East Jerusalem becoming the capital of a future Palestinian state. A number of the tents, notably the one in Sheikh Jarrah, have been built by Palestinian residents forcibly evicted from their homes as a result of Israel’s racist policy. Palestinians, who became refugees in 1948 & 1967 are, once again, facing dispossession from their homes and land as our governments stand by and do nothing.

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Berlin: Schwarzer Kanal received an eviction date for 31/12/2009

Wagenplatz Schwarzer Kanal is an open community project, run not only by the people who live there, but by a wider community who use it for events, workshops, art, film evenings, bike fixing, concerts, Vöku, cabaret or as base for political actions… and! For that we have a big stage area, a wagen for hosting workshops, an open air cinema, a community kitchen wagen, a bike workshop wagen, a fire and bar area…..

The schwarzer kanal has received an eviction date for 31.12.2009. This has come from the owners of the land Hoch Tief, who say that they need all of the land we occupy to start a huge building project and for the access roads to the site. Hoch Tief claim that they dont want to start the building project so soon, but unless they start the developement in 2010 they will have to pay a large fine to the building regulators (BIMA). Over the last few years, our location in the Media spree development zone in central Berlin has put us in the firing line of an invasion of big companies, and the gentrification of Kreutzberg-Mitte. However this is the first time we have recieved a concrete eviction date. Schwarzer Kanal is mobilising to resist, and maintain our unique status as a queer political and cultural wagenplatz. Schwarzer kanal is incomparable to just another concrete box. Help us to resist this eviction! For information and updates join our email list:

send an email to schwarzerkanal[AAA]squat.net with the heading “verteiler”

Further information and updates to follow!

Schwarzer Kanal bleibt!

More info: http://schwarzerkanal.squat.net

Bristol: Callout for 2 days of direct action on the 18th & 19th of September 2009

As the global economy grinds to a halt so too do the big capital development projects, luxury apartment blocks and shopping complexes that have threatened us with displacement for so long.

Meanwhile, this new round of crisis capitalism leaves thousands out of work, buried in debt and facing immanent home repossession. Instead of housing the homeless in these empties or canceling the debts of millions governments pump billions into the banks to save this rotten system and violently repress those that resist. [Read More]

Lund (Sweden): Mass Squatting Action Videos/Photos

On May 16th, over 1000 people gathered to participate in the occupation movement festival in Lund, which featured food, music, entertainment and of course SQUATTING! During Saturday two buildings, Bredgatan 4 and Observatory in the City Park were occupied, and during the night so were Sunday two unused buildings on the St Lars.

In addition to the imaginative tactics the activists used to outwit the cops, different blocks were subject to random and ordered police violence. [Read More]

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Eviction of a squat in St. Petersburg

25th of May in the morning, police evicted squat “Pila” in Ligovsky prospect in St. Petersburg, which had existed for half a year. While police was breaking in, people managed to escape from windows with some valuables, and no-one was arrested. However many valuables were also stolen or destroyed by the cops, for example musical instruments of the squatters. 8 people were living in “Pila” and many activities were organised there. As most Russian squats, “Pila” was clandestine and its existence was not openly announced. Another such squat where concerts were organised was also recently uncovered in Vasilevsky island, and it had to be abandonded due to security threats.

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Berlin: Brunnen 183 to be evicted June 18th. Get mobilized now!

Brunnen 183 to be evicted June 18th. Get mobilized now!

Housing project Brunnen 183 and Umsonstladen (free shop) in Berlin are to be evicted on June 18th at 07:00 a.m.. The letters from court that announce the eviction arrived today, May 26th. Inhabitants, users and supporters of the house hereby call for support and solidarity of any kind anywhere at any time. Come to Berlin, be there, be loud, start a riot!

>From June 6th to June 21st there will be Action Weeks organized by the wba-campaign (?wir bleiben alle!? – ?we’re all gonna stay!?).

http://actiondays.blogsport.de

Places to sleep and infrastructure will be at hand. Those who can’t come to Berlin are invited kindly to ?get active? from now on and whereever possible!

Houses belong to those who live in them! Defend 183! Destroy the city! We’re all gonna stay!

 

Solidarity blog: http://brunnen183.blogsport.de

Berlin: Rigaer94–The Struggle Continues!

Berlin’s Police Chief and LKA 5 (Landeskriminalamt) give the following prognosis

The theme of gentrification will also be meaningful in the year 2009. Previous actions with a high degree of mobilization highlight, that this theme and the retention and expansion of leftist open spaces (Freiräume) rank very highly in importance within the scene. It is to be taken into account, that major actions by the police against individuals and infrastructure of the leftist scene will be “responded” to by crimes against the infrastructure of both local and federal police or institutions relating to the courts. Furthermore, it is to be taken into account that the manifold actions (for example unregistered and spontaneous demonstrations) that follow such measures can result in violent confrontations.”

Thank you very much for this realistic analysis. We couldn’t have said it any better! Something is afoot in Berlin: People are taking more and more to the streets, refusing to peacefully surrender to the political fairy tale. This was demonstrated recently by the “Wir Bleiben Alle” [We’re all staying] campaign, which organized a mass mobilization for self-organized open spaces on March 14th, 2009 under the motto, “united we stay” [originally in English]. 5000 loud and determined people took to the streets and combatively showed their displeasure with the police. Even better: more and more actions are piling up, and demos are becoming uncontrollable for police! This was also seen in this year’s May 1st.

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London: Eco-Village Occupation, near Hammersmith, London, June 6th.

The land is everybodys.

For immediate release…

Background:

In May 1996, 500 The Land is Ours activists occupied 13 acres of derelict land on the banks of the River Thames in Wandsworth, highlighting the misuse of urban land, the lack of provision of affordable housing and the deterioration of the urban environment. That action grew into far more than just a simple land rights action.

A community grew up on the site called Pure Genius!! over the 5½ months that the occupation lasted for…..

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Berlin: 06.06. – 21.06. 2009 — Wir bleiben alle!

This year there will be the „We all stay! Action Weeks” again. Since the decentralized DIY concept of protest was so successfull last year we will continue to rely on it this year. An preparation group will provide an infrastructure with sleeping places, info points, website, radio, ticker etc. The rest of the program is in your hands. Think about how to organize your protest against the dominating city planning. Be creative and visible for the general public or organize yourself silently.

We want to give people an opportunity to make their frustration and rejection about announced evictions of autonomous spaces, rising rents, ever growing surveillance, about control of public spaces and of course about profit-oriented and therefore exclusionary politics from the Berlin government. But its not all about Berlin. We want to offer a stage to all emancipatory projects, collectives and campaigns that wish to inform people about themselves, about their struggle, their problems and their success. Here again: DIY! Hold workshops, start direct action!

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Lund, Sweden: Report from Squatting festival “165”

Report from squatting festival in Lund, Sweden 16-17, May 2009

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Background

For many years in Sweden, squatting houses has been something not attempted very often, a lot because of the no-tolerance laws and practice by the Swedish state. The attempts during the last 15-20 years met heavy sentences and the interest in squatting sank to a low level. After the eviction of Ungdomshuset in Copenhagen many were inspired by the resistance and the movement that arose around the fight for a youth house, and the idea started to seem more real again. During the international squat days of action in April 2008 several houses were squatted in many Swedish cities, purposely during a limited time to make public activities. [Read More]

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Poznan, Poland: Rozbrat demo and a wide support from abroad

On Saturday, 9th May, at around 3 p.m. a demonstration organized by Rozbrat Collective took place, it started in front of the Opera House. Around 1,000-1,500 took part in it. The participants of the demonstration were also people from different organizations and groups such as Anarchist Federation, members of different groups of protests from Poznan neighborhoods, including those protesting against the F-16 airport, anti-eviction organizations, alternative theaters’ members, trade unionists from different unions, representatives of the Berlin autonomous communities, squatters from different cities in Poland and abroad and loads of other supporters of Rozbrat from Poznan, Poland and abroad…..MORE INFO ABOUT THE DEMONSTRATION AND ACTIONS ABROAD, PHOTOS: http://rozbrat.org/news-in-english

Rozbrat stays!