Second edition of Venice Climate Camp to be held at CS Rivolta

By: sisulscz - August 26th, 2020  Filed under: Communique

We have decided, as Centro Sociale Rivolta, to host the second edition of the Venice Climate Camp. There will be four days of debates, assemblies and discussions on the ecological and climate crisis. A moment of confrontation and organization for local and global struggles for climate and social justice. We have chosen, for this year, to move this edition to Rivolta to guarantee maximum possible safety and tranquility for the participants. We will take all the necessary precautionary measures by implementing a specific protocol that has at its core the concept of care and responsibility for one’s community.

More info (Italian)

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Leipzig: Luwi71, the negotiations have broken down.

By: fawda - August 25th, 2020  Filed under: Communique, News

Today the squatters have spoken with the Office for Housing and Urban Renewal. The boss, Mr. Dr.-Ing. Frank Amey, has direct contact to the owner and announced that the owner has cancelled the scheduled negotiations. Speculations of the office suggest that the owner wanted to demolish the house and build a new one. This is not possible because of the law for the protection of the existing building. Now the capital interests of the owner are shifting towards buying or renting by the occupying persons. Kaya, spoke person from Leipzig Besetzen, explained: “We are angry that no talks at eye level are possible. It is therefore difficult for us to take the existing offer of talks with the owner about the office seriously.
Sasha adds: “Should the owner decide to come to Leipzig, he/she knows where we are and where we will stay. During the conversation it emerged that the law enforcement authorities could construct a threat situation. This would result from possibly defective building fabric and the resulting damage to health. [Read More]

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UK: How to Challenge a Section 21 Notice

By: fawda - August 25th, 2020  Filed under: News

Despite the government’s temporary pause on eviction proceedings the system is going to be back soon enough — here’s what you need to know if you’re facing it.

We are likely to see a wave of evictions sweep the country come the end of next month, following the end of a suspension of nearly all court possession cases until (currently) September 20th. Whether or not this will be temporarily extended again, unless substantial legislative changes are instituted, Shelter anticipates that over 230,000 renters are at risk of eviction, in large part due to falling into rent arrears linked to job losses, reductions in income, and shielding during the Covid-19 outbreak. What this means is that it is still vital that renters understand their legal rights and the ways in which they can challenge an eviction notice.

Of greatest notoriety are Section 21 notices, commonly referred to as “no fault” evictions. These only apply to assured shorthold tenancies, which are the most common kind of private rented tenancy. They are the most common kind of eviction in the private rented sector, used for more than 80% of evictions against private tenants. And such notices are a delight to landlords as they do not have to offer a reason for evicting their tenant — no matter if you paid the bills on time, fixed up the plug sockets, bought the landlord a bouquet of flowers for Christmas (gross, don’t do this) — despite all the good behaviour in the world, a Section 21 eviction notice can still arrive at your door. [Read More]

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UK: Notes for New Squatters

By: fawda - August 24th, 2020  Filed under: News

The government’s U-turn on evictions is merely a temporary reprieve — and today Freedom is publishing this newly updated Advisory Service for Squatters guide, which will only get more relevant as the year wears on.

Squatting means occupying empty buildings, or land, without permission. Normally, it means homeless people finding somewhere to live, for a while at least, but what people do with the space they occupy is up to them. The following is a very basic guide. For more information or if you have any problems contact the Advisory Service for Squatters (ASS).

Non-residential squatting is still legal

Squatting in non-residential buildings, or where there has been an agreement, is still a civil matter. To resolve it the owner has to take you to court. The owners have legal ways and procedures to have squatters evicted and cannot legally use force or threats. Section 6 of the Criminal Law Act 1977 makes it an offence to force entry to a building which is occupied, and this includes squats. This will no longer help against the police if they are enforcing the new law against squatters in residential properties, but is otherwise still valid. This is explained in the Legal Warnings, which squatters have either on display or ready to show people. [Read More]

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Leipzig: Ludwigstraße 71 squatted

By: fawda - August 22nd, 2020  Filed under: Communique, News

Press release – occupation Ludwigstraße 71, August 22nd 2020

The occupation of Ludwigstraße 71 has survived the first night. Activists are still staying in the apartment building. According to the LVZ the owner should come to Leipzig on Wednesday and be ready to talk to the activists. Until then the house is under police observation.

“We would be pleased if the owner would also contact us directly”, says Kaya from Leipzig Besetzen. Since the beginning of the occupation, the group emphasized its willingness to conduct negotiations on an equal basis and presented a utilization concept.

“We expect restraint from the police,” agrees Sasha, also from Leipzig Besetzen. The day before, there had been an increased police presence in the neighboring streets. In the meantime, police officers tried to gain access to the building from Mariannenstraße. To do this, the police blocked the front doors of adjacent residential buildings when residents left them. Additionally there were harassment of passers-by by police officers. [Read More]

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Thessaloniki: Political statement of the squat Terra Incognita. International call for solidarity

By: fawda - August 21st, 2020  Filed under: Communique, News

In the morning of 17th of August Terra Incognita gets TEMPORARILY evicted by the repressive forces of neoliberalism. Police forces intrude in the building and conduct researches for hours and confiscations. Days after the eviction the squat still remains open with cops celebrating TEMPORARILY their capability of violating every corner of our liberalized grounds.

For over 16 years Terra Incognita consituted a meeting place for hundrends of people of the struggling social basis. With constant events, direct acts, demonstrations and conflicts Terra Incognita was present in moments of the violent struggle against the violence of the state, the benefits of capitalistic monopolies, against the violating authority of fascism and patriarchy, against any type of discrimination and speciesism. In the grounds of the self-organised structures of self-education, solidarity and mutual aid of the squat all the “known-unknown” strugglers of freedom met and will continue to meet. Liberating and equallity-based relationships were constructed, subversive plans and operations, dreams that day by day found and still find a space of moral and physical substance. For 16 years the squat proves itself to be the flesh of the flesh of the multiform struggle against any type of authority and opression, without prioritizing or distinguishing the means that contribute to the spreading of libertarian ideas and the organization of social and class-conscious counter attack. Because for us this is liberation. [Read More]

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Gap: Cesaï violently and illegally evicted

By: fawda - August 21st, 2020  Filed under: Announcement, Communique

On Wednesday 19 August, at six o’clock, police officers broke down the doors of the rooms of the inhabitants of Césaï, the Gap autonomous social centre, with a battering ram. They gather everyone in a courtyard and check their identities. This is the beginning of the eviction from Cesaï.

Results: 43 people outside, 20 staying in campsites, 2 boarded at the station. 43 exiled and homeless people who barely had time to take their belongings and collect food before Cesaï was walled up. 43 people on the Place Saint Arnoux, in front of the Prefecture, soon joined by militants.

A camp is being organized while waiting for a solution that will not come from the Prefecture, which is increasingly afraid of the famous “vacuum effect”. While waiting for a place to sleep and to put down their bags, families, young migrants, Dublin cases and homeless young people are all astonished to find themselves homeless in a few hours. [Read More]

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Thessaloniki: Terra Incognita evicted

By: fawda - August 18th, 2020  Filed under: Communique, News

This morning (17 August), around 5 am, the uniformed scum of the greek police invaded Terra Incognita in Thessaloniki, which is a building that has been occupied since 2004 and constitutes a landmark of struggle and the anarchist movement in the city.

The cops proceeded to evacuate the building, while technical and material equipment was confiscated and a large part of the resources within the building have been withheld.

More specifically, equipment from the following anarchist infrastructures housed within the squat, was confiscated: the medical -first aid infrastructure, the gym, the library and the printing infrastructure, as well as a large archive of posters and other printed material that date decades. [Read More]

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Calais: associations refer cases to the Human Rights Defender and UN rapporteurs on the situation of migrants

By: fawda - August 15th, 2020  Filed under: News

Today took place in Calais the 693rd eviction from an informal living space since 1 January 2020. As of 13 August 2020, the fundamental rights of the exiled people surviving in Calais are still not respected (Human Rights Observers).

Thirteen associations working with migrants in Calais announced on Friday that they had contacted the Human Rights Defender, as well as seven United Nations special rapporteurs on human rights, to “alert them to the inhuman living conditions” of refugees.

In Calais, the evictions of camps are continuing and police repression of migrants has increased since the arrival of Gérald Darmanin at the Ministry of the Interior, according to human rights groups present in the area.

In an attempt to make their voices heard, thirteen of them – including the Auberge des Migrants, Médecins du Monde and Secours Catholique – seized on Friday 14 August the Human Rights Defender Claire Hédon, whose mandate has just begun, as well as seven United Nations special rapporteurs on human rights. [Read More]

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Saint-Denis: Two weeks after the eviction from Aubervilliers camp, hundreds of migrants return home

By: fawda - August 15th, 2020  Filed under: News

Between 300 and 400 migrants live under the bridge of the A1 motorway in Saint-Denis in totally undignified conditions, only fifteen days after the eviction from the Aubervilliers camp. The associations denounce an absurd situation where evictions and resettlements follow one another without any lasting solution.

At the time of the eviction from the Aubervilliers camp on 29 July, Pierre Henry, the director general of France Terre d’Asile, had said to himself “See you in September”, certain that the camp would be re-formed in a few weeks.

We didn’t have to wait that long. Less than a fortnight after the eviction of the 1,500 or so people living in the camp, “between 300 and 400” people found refuge under the A1 motorway bridge at Saint-Denis. They are single men, mostly from Afghanistan.

Among them, some “missed the eviction of Aubervilliers, others had an administrative appointment that day and could not be present”, says Maël, a member of the association Utopia 56 who did not want his surname to be made public. Among these hundreds of exiles, there are also newcomers who only found this unhealthy place to settle. [Read More]

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Belo Horizonte (Brazil): For Squat Kasa Invisível, keep your support, we’re almost there!

By: xxx - August 15th, 2020  Filed under: News, video

First of all, we want to thank every one, every collective, union, and groups supporting us! We already reached almost 2,000 dolars to fix the entire roof of our squat. Keep sharing the message to those which are in a position to help us keep our work and our house! Stay safe and healthy!

Video Campaign:

[Read More]

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Wassenaar: The Danger of Occupied Ivicke

By: sisulscz - August 13th, 2020  Filed under: Communique

Why does the municipality of Wassenaar consider our residency at Ivicke to be a “danger”? And what exactly are we endangering? Here, I will give these questions some space, that necessarily lead us back in time.

In January 2019, Ivicke’s owner requested the municipality to enforce the bestemmingsplan (zoning plan), which was rejected a few months later in June. The municipality justified this decision by pointing out that our eviction would constitute a danger to public order given the owner’s lack of a plan for the building – that is, more vacancy could lead to a second act of squatting.

[Sidenote: The notorious bestemmingsplan is the bureaucratic destiny of Ivicke which was changed to an office function in the 1980s from its original purpose as residency. Thereafter, antisquat companies, hired by the current owner, made use of some rooms, which moves in a legal grey area but is tolerated due to its corporate nature and temporary status. While our residency is quite certainly of a temporary nature as well, the bestemmingsplan has been used as a strategy to evict the “danger” we pose by both the owner and the municipality.]

Back in time: The owner’s lawyer appealed on 29th of July, which was received on the 31st of July by the municipality – interesting timing, as the mayor got to know about the upcoming No Border Camp (NBC: 01.08.-04.08.) on the 30th of July. The NBC is an international gathering with workshops and actions, that inform about and act against the inhumane migratory policies of EU-states, and that aim to connect struggles in other parts of the world. Here, we pause in time because those days were packed with legal procedures and political struggles.

After the owner’s lawyer was informed about our plans with the terrain, she took the municipality to court in order to force them to prohibit the upcoming camp. When the judge didn’t grant her will, she went in appeal hoping that another judge would forbid the – at that point – ongoing camp. Luckily, this didn’t happen and the NBC proceeded. It is however interesting to investigate the lawyer’s justification for this legal upheaval. Her main argument emphasised the potential harm that the activities during the camp could cause to the monument. Her concern is quite ridiculous, as she is representing the person – Ronnie van de Putte – that has remorselessly observed the gradual degradation of the monument and not taken any steps to prevent its eventual destruction.
[Read More]

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