A office building in Amsterdam Noord was squatted successfully this afternoon [3/7/16]. It is one of many empty commercial buildings in the area. The group wants to use the building as a living space and a place for creative activity in the neighborhood. The object is one of many similar empty buildings in the street, most of which have their darkest corners inhibited by anti kraak.
Many thanxxx to all supporters!
Hello! We in Hungary are in deep protest. The government decided to demolish part of our City Park (Városliget). We don’t like this. So on march 17th 2016, when they started to cut down trees, it was enough. Men and women jumped over the fence, broke the barrier and it was over. Since then, we occupy the area. It is a pretty big complex more than 5 buildings, several floors with its own garden and parking area in the middle of this huge park. There are over 20 people living here now. We build, create, imagine. We started actions outside of camp too, with more or less success. This created lot of attention from the public, so the power holders decided to take action. This is where everyone comes into picture. We need help. We need to grow rapidly, to transform. We need people from all over the globe with experience in nonviolent protest. We have food, place to sleep, love to share. Please please help us with your presence.
We the Ligetvédők (Occupy City Park Budapest) have been occupying this area for more than 100 days, for we think it is unjust and harmful to transform Városliget (City Park) into a museum district (Liget Budapest Project). We are locals, civilians and experts, among whom many have been protesting for years against this huge prestige-investment. [Read More]
Each day is Day X until we got Kadterschmiede back
…and until the existence of Kanal, Linie, Potse/Drugstore, M99 is no longer threatened.
The list of projects in Berlin facing eviction is long. The pressure on alternative living spaces and other places where me can meet up, exchange our ideas and develop alternatives is constantly increasing. So is our anger. We’re pissed off.
On June 22nd cops broke into R94 at 7:30am without prior notice. They were sent by a politician acting on the demands of a former Aparheit attourney. In the following process of eviction they destroyed most of Kadterschmiede, the yard and the ground floor and threw out everything that was left. Since then the rest of the house is under siege by securities and cops.
The people living in R94 have been assaulted verbally, physically and sexualized by the besiegers. They have lost any kind of privacy and are facing random controls when entering their home. People without papers who had been living in the house so they don’t have to face the dehumanizing situations in the Lager (=official refugee camps) before the attack had to rashly leave their homes and have been unable to return. [Read More]
Why we have occupied and established the New Neighborhood Auditorium in Hagsätra – a statement
Hagsätra, a predominantly low income suburb in southern Stockholm previously dominated by affordable public housing, has been sold off in its entirety to private landlords. Most of it now belongs to the Ikea-owned corporation Ikano, who already many years ago purchased the suburb’s center square and whose presence in the suburb is daunting. Upon arrival with the metro you are greeted by 15 massive flags that tower over the square. The flags of Ikano. Fairs and events arranged for locals are called Ikano—something. A youth center that was publicly funded and on the center square was suddenly closed some years ago and moved to the back side of a building facing the highway at the fringe of the suburb. This youth center is now run by Ikano and they have hired permanent security staff to surveil the few teenagers who go there. It is reasonable to assume that this is part of an effort to clear out unwanted elements from their central property. Just as the overall ambition with their whole turf is to raise property value, which effectively means clearing out current unwanted elements from the residential population. The method is simple: make it economically impossible to stay. [Read More]
In the last few days the Hungarian media has been full of stories about clashes among three groups in Budapest’s famed park Városliget (City Grove): the so-called “grove defenders” (ligetvédők), members of a private security firm recruited from skinheads hanging around football stadiums to protect the demolition/construction crew, and the Hungarian police.
Városliget is one of the oldest city parks in the world, dating to around 1810, although work on it continued through most of the nineteenth century. By now Városliget definitely needs a face-lift to restore it to its former beauty. But what’s going on right now, in the opinion of the grove defenders, is the destruction of the park as a public space for recreation as well as a source of respite from all the stone and brick that makes up Budapest, especially its Pest half. It is being turned into a “museum quarters.”
Viktor Orbán, most likely at the suggestion of the director of the Museum of Fine Arts, László Baán, decided on the creation of a museum quarters. But the idea of clustering museums was in reality just attractive packaging of what amounted to an eviction notice. Several galleries currently housed in the former royal palace must move because Viktor Orbán wants to put the core of his government where in his opinion it belongs, the ancient seat of the Kingdom of Hungary. [Read More]
It has now been over a week since our doors were first cut off, cops and security intruded into our housing project, installing themselves in our stairways and other previously collective spaces. From then, the speedy and aggressive eviction and destruction of the ground level of our home began. Our social space, the Kadterschmiede, along with our workshop, laundry, attic and garden were stripped of all recognition in clouds of dust and mortar, while rubbish skips were filled with our belongings and collective histories.
[Read More]
On June 8th 2016, we occupied a building on 96 Themistokleous Street in Exarchia with the aim of building a community based political space. As a diverse group with a variety of backgrounds we were aware that although we had many common goals and the same political strategy, we disagreed on tactics and levels of risks we were willing to take. Our hope was that through working and learning together within our collective and our involvement within the wider community struggle we would overcome these differences.
However very soon we were faced with heavy police oppression, including a forceful eviction which resulted in three arrests. Instinctively we decided to resist this oppression by immediately re-squatting the building and asked for the support of the rest of the community to defend it. Some squats chose to support us and some didn’t.
We recognise that the lack of support was mainly a consequence of our lack of communication and political engagement with the existing assemblies and we are willing to accept that we made a mistake.
After a long discussion within the collective it became apparent that unfortunately the threat of repeated eviction and arrests divided us even more politically than before. So we decided to leave the house and concentrate our efforts on supporting other existing squats. [Read More]
A small group of committed activists in Budapest have set up a camp in Városliget, or City Park, to stop the government from clearing trees for the construction of a new museum quarter.
In October of 2015, the Hungarian government approved an approximately $729 million master plan for erecting new buildings in the oldest and biggest public park in Budapest, which is also known as “the Liget.” The construction is part of a controversial park renewal plan called the Liget Budapest Project.
The project’s website boasts the transformation of the Liget into “a world standard, complex, family-friendly cultural and recreational park” bringing in annually an additional million tourists. However, the plan involves reconfiguring the park landscape for construction, including removing hundreds of trees and existing infrastructure — something many citizens do not support.
On March 17, when workers from Városliget Zrt., or the City Park Property Development Company — the business that is contracted to renovate the park and construct the buildings — began clearing trees in an area that is marked for the construction of the Hungarian House of Music, a group of 15 to 20 activists arrived to stop them. Determined to protect the trees and the park, the activists are still there 15 weeks later. [Read More]
The recent developments in Athens are marked by a retreating state, overwhelmed by the task of implementing the EU-Turkey deal as well as the obligatory provision of accommodation and nutrition to ~57,000 ‘persons of care’. In the city of Athens, the everyday subsistence of people, who planned to merely pass through Greece on their way up north, has largely fallen back on self-organised autonomous structures aided by anti-state activists and non-state volunteers. Various squats (occupied empty buildings, most of which are owned publicly) with different organizational features and political aims have popped up on the map. Some serve the need of accommodation as housing squats, others function as social centres, with its activities ranging from the free (re)distribution of goods such as clothing and food items and housing self-organised kitchens-crews to the creation of spaces for political organizing and (legal) info-points. Most of these squats can be found in the neighborhood of Exarchia, with its history of autonomous self-organisation and a strong anarchist movement. But there are exceptions to this rule (e.g. City Plaza Hotel) and the following is an attempted short overview about the numerous squats. Some are well-known, others might be completely unheard of outside of Athens, some have opened up recently in the last few weeks, others have been running for months. It is neither an exhaustive list nor a complete and detailed account of events, but rather an attempt to communicate the very basics about different squats and solidarity-projects and their usefulness vis-à-vis the substandard and insufficient government-run camps. [Read More]
Comrades are currently mobilising in the streets to make the eviction as expensive as possible for the cops and the Berlin Senate. Below is today’s announcement by Rigaer94.
This morning, June 22nd 2016, at around 7.30am, approximately 300 cops, private security and construction workers came to our house in Rigaerstrasse 94. First, the construction workers cut out our doors and removed them. After securing their place in the house, the cops, construction workers and security, took position in the garden, the yard and on the roof, as well as in the staircases. Construction workers and cops joined together to carry out all movable objects they could find in the yard – bicycles, a bike shed, fridges, trailers etc. Our doors were removed and the frames knocked out, the phone and internet connection was cut. Only after our lawyer got access to the house, we were informed about the reason for the police action.
In cooperation with Crna Luknja, the anarchist radio show on Radio Student in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, we produced the following interview on the ongoing struggle against the attempted eviction of Rog, a former bicycle factory and an active squat for 10 years now. The interview focuses on the resistance against the attempts of eviction by the city as well as Nazi attacks and also on the political framework right now in Slovenia.
A privately owned building on Anexartisias street, Exarcheia district, was occupied by a queer feminist group since May 28th until today (16/6/16). The police evacuated the squat and proceeded to the arrest of many activists while supporters held a solidarity rally at the Attica Police Inspectorate. Below is the announcement of the squat as published on Contra Info:
”This morning Women*Squat, a queer feminist squat, which began on May 28th in a privately owned building on 13 Anexartisias street, was evacuated by cops and 6 people were arrested (3 adults and 3 children). The purpose of the squat was to provide a shelter to women with/without papers in a space we would all organize together. Updates will follow.
We call for a solidarity rally at the Attica Police Inspectorate at 13:00.
Immediate release of all the arrested activists
Women*squat”
(via Provo.gr, translated by BlackCat)
https://insurrectionnewsworldwide.com/2016/06/16/greece-queer-feminist-squat-evicted-in-exarcheia/
