El Kubo and CSO La Ruïna are two liberated buildings in La Bonanova (an upper class neighbourhood of Barcelona), which with much insistence and after two re-occupations have resisted for the last seven and four years respectively, being home to many people and hosting hundreds of activities.
After the last eviction date of El Kubo, dictated for March 25th, which we managed to suspend, and after a month of resistance where we received daily attacks, on Tuesday May 2nd we decided to make an antifascist call to defend both spaces from the harassment of political parties disguised as citizen’s response.
We understand that getting to the gates of La Ruïna in a militarized neighborhood has already been a triumph. First of all, we would like to thank all of you who came to support us. We still need your presence and that solidarity continues to spread. [Read More]
Amsterdam: Court case Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal 302, demonstration
Thursday 1st December 2022, demonstration, 18:00, Het Monument, Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal 302.
Right now, we are housing four people. If we are evicted, they are without a home, and the Monument would be left empty yet again. Once again, Slumlord Hagedoorn would get get his eviction, while he leaves property empty all over the country. The past has shown that the authorities tend to side with property against the right to housing. Nevertheless, we’re ready to fight. We demand housing justice and an end to vacancy for financial speculation! Thursday, after our court case, we’re organising a MEGA demo. If we win, we celebrate the Monument. If we don’t, we’ll show that we’re not leaving quietly. Join our demo!!!!! [Read More]
Amsterdam: Housing justice now! Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal 302 squatted
Sunday 23 october, rolling out a giant banner, squatters’ collective Mokum Kraakt announced that it has squatted four days ago Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal 302. House peace is set, preventing the police to immediately evict. Here their public statement:
The city is cracking at the seams. The housing crisis is far from over. On top of that the energy and inflation crises are causing daily life as such to be unaffordable. At the same time, real estate investors, landlords and speculators are being pampered while mass tourism and gentrification are wrecking the liveability of the city.
The people of Amsterdam are succumbing under capital’s dead weight. Mokum is succumbing under the lack of space for young people, working people, poor people, refugees and old people. Mokum is succumbing under the stranglehold of the rich and the proprietors and the slow suffocation of alternative culture.
But Mokum fights back. We no longer accept that our city is for the rich only. That the economic and commercial interests of real estate owners are unassailable. That we can no longer give shape to our own city, its culture, the way that we live. And that living space is wasted on vacancy and neglect when most Amsterdammers may soon not be able to afford their flats, their energy or their food. [Read More]
Ljubljana: statement from the Anarchist Initiative in support of the new autonomous center PLAC
It gives us great joy to welcome the establishment of a new autonomous space PLAC in Ljubljana that started today with the communal-political occupation of the empty, derelict, and publicly-owned building on Linhart Street!
We see this occupation as a protest against the existing social order and as a concrete answer to the daily worsening of social circumstances and problems such an order creates.
Occupation is a political act of emancipation and direct action that addresses important social issues, pertaining to all of us and our collective futures. The housing crisis, high rent, and lack of non-commercial spaces for creativity and action are but a few of these issues. Indirectly, it also addresses rampant corruption, social inequality, and the distribution of the Commonwealth. The newly occupied publicly-owned building, that is managed by the DUTB (‘bad bank’ organization) quite literally represents the money we all paid for the great bank bailout of 2012. Back then, the name of the game was a shameless transfer of wealth from the have-nots to the haves. With this occupation, we are returning a small part of that stolen money to the people for communal use. [Read More]
Ljubljana: PLAC, new autonomous zone squatted
Last Saturday, a new autonomous zone was established in Ljubljana, called the Participatory Ljubljana Autonomous Zone (PLAC). The squat is located at 43 Linhartova Street, behind Bežigrad.
Around 13:00 on Saturday 3rd september, around 100 people entered the abandoned building of the former canteen of the Ljubljana Road Company at 43 Linhartova Street and declared the occupied building an autonomous zone. They wrote that they had created “a space for all those who have been sidelined by the socio-political order and deprived of the infrastructure for their cultural and political participation and the realization of their aspirations”. In the hours following the occupation of the empty building, the premises and the surrounding area were cleaned up. [Read More]
Amsterdam: Film afternoon about housing struggle in Oost
Film afternoon about housing struggle in Oost at Joe’s Garage from 16:00 till 18:00 on 20 july 2022.
On the basis of footage of residents’ actions by the Squatter Group East (Kraakgroep Oost) and the Tenants’ Association East (Huurdersvereniging Oost), we will discuss many years of resistance against this still ongoing attack on affordable housing.
The program also includes a new film about Frans Ondunk, chairman of the Tenants’ Association East, but also known as the Sheriff of East, who fired at landlords on a daily basis.
Throughout the history of Amsterdam East, the squatting movement and the local tenants’ association have propagated the same message with regularity. The property owners whose properties were squatted were often the same as those of the properties in which tenants were terrorized. [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]
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]
Amsterdam: Mokum Kraakt squats on the Kinkerstraat
Statement from Mokum Kraakt on 13 March 2022 after the squatting of Kinkerstraat 304 ground floor.
We are action group Mokum Kraakt. We are a mix of Hotel Mokum, Kinderen van Mokum and other squatters: young and old, experienced and new, but we’re all angry, full of love for Amsterdam and ready to fight for our city. Since 10th of march we are settled on Kinkerstraat, in one of the many empty shops in Amsterdam. Because Amsterdam belongs to its residents, not to big capital. We demand radical change. We demand accessible, livable and affordable housing. We demand a just and free city.
Underneath the clean and smooth streets, the city is collapsing. It’s almost invisible how the foundation of a lively city is beginning to burst under a layer of monoculture. In the cracks that Mokum Squats, spaces for counterculture are forming themselves. Spaces to experiment, to meet and to live. [Read More]
Athens: Call for participation in the defense of the Squatted Community of Prosfygika
Hello comrades,
We address this call to collectives and individuals from all around the world to join the combative defense of Prosfygika against the imminent repression. The attempted evacuation of our neighborhood must be turned into a central event of resistance and a victory against political power and the gentrification of our neighborhoods in the metropolis.
WHAT WE INVITE YOU TO DEFEND:
The building complex of Prosfygika was built in 1933 for the refugees coming from Asia minor.
In the conditions of the time, a vibrant working class neighbourhood with communal characteristics emerged. Today,it is one of the biggest building complexes in the center of Athens, which is still not gentrified and exploited by big investors or the state. It is a place of strategic significance, since it is located between the two ‘pillars’ of authority – the Supreme Court on one hand and the Police Headquarters on the other.
Within this socio-spatial frame, some militants, who were already living in the neighborhood as squatters, decided to organize. In 2010 they initiated the Community of Squatted Prosfygika, having as its central decision-making political organ the Assembly of Squatted Prosfygika (SY.KA.PRO.). A communal body for everyday life and political struggle. [Read More]
Amsterdam: Hotel Mokum is dead, long live Hotel Mokum
Dear Friends,
Let’s start with thank you. The support and solidarity we have received over the past six weeks, but especially this weekend, has been overwhelming. On Saturday, we were harshly evicted, with police brutality and a demonstration of power. More on this later, but for now: so much love for everyone who stood there with us. And especially so much love for the people who voluntarily exposed themselves to state violence, prosecution and very literal physical violence by the police. Many thanks to Extinction Rebellion and Comrade Twingo without whom the eviction would have been a lot easier for the police. Thanks to everyone who helped us ensure that Hotel Mokum could not be quietly swept away. But also thank you to everyone who supported us in any other way, this weekend and for the past six weeks. You are all so amazing and so fucking brave and we couldn’t have done this without you. [Read More]
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