Calais: Communiqué from Housing for All Calais

Housing is a right, even in Calais.

We are a group of people from different countries fighting for everyone’s right to dignified and safe housing. We are currently occupying, for over 48 hours, some of the many buildings in the city of Calais that sit empty and wasted while people sleep on the streets.

We occupy these spaces hoping to break the vicious cycle of state and police violence and dehumanisation that continues in Calais and across the world to enforce national borders. We aim to create an open space free from state violence and discrimination, where someone’s administrative status has no impact on their ability to have their basic needs met, experience solidarity, and live in dignity. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Statement Squatting action Waldeck Pyrmontlaan 8

[update: Waldeck Pyrmontlaan 8 was evicted on sunday evening 16 January. 8 people got arrested in total, one of them outside the house. Some remained anonymous while in custody. Everybody was released the next day in the afternoon, accused of breaking domestic peace and squatting.]

In the last few months many have been taking action as part of a broader housing struggle. The recent housing demonstrations have revealed that we are massive in numbers, and that there is a urgent need for affordable housing, but the political system is incapable of real and meaningful change.

There is a growing awareness that this struggle needs to be anti-capitalist. A respect for a diversity of tactics is essential in this fight. Housing struggle is class war. We continue this fight here, by collectively taking back a space from those in power. All the wealth in the world is created by the workers, today we take back what is ours, lets bring back the commons.

We have squatted Waldeck Pyrmontlaan 8, and we will use it as a home for houseless students and a political space for Autonomous Student Struggle. In this space, we want to share knowledge that doesn’t rely on opressive power structures and to actively organise against capitalism and the state, for a free world where everyone can live meaningful and fulfilling lives. We are not free until everyone is free.

The housing ‘crisis’ doesn’t exist, scarcity of housing is a myth -the problem is the unequal distribution of wealth. The problem is capitalism. When we squat, we don’t ask politicians to secure our housing needs: we do it ourselves! Rent is theft, all housing should be free, we want a world without private property. [Read More]

Thessaloniki: gathering in solidarity with those arrested during the eviction of the new occupation

In the early morning of Wednesday 12 January at 05:45 am, once again, masked security guards approach the space occupied on Monday 10 in solidarity with the eviction of the occupation of the sketi at the biological building, which took place on new year’s eve, while at the same time police vans are lined up in the streets around the university campus and riot cops invade the campus. The squat was guarded by comrades, who defended it with dignity. The known garbage of repression, with their known murderous intentions, sought to drown the occupiers with tear gas and by using stun grenades in a space where they did not even know what materials were left over from the former use of the space as a pharmaceutical laboratory. Of course we have no doubt that ridiculous and misleading narratives will be played out by the state and the media about the materials that were already in the space and the destruction that the cops themselves caused in their rage when they invaded the space, smashing windows and walls. Besides, it seems that the cops’ sledgehammers have the magical property of making the spaces usable for the university and student community… [Read More]

Berlin: Habersaathstraße reoccupied

We – homeless and homeless people, refugees and people with a migration history, employees in social associations and people involved in rental policy – are fed up with vacancies. That’s why today, on Saturday, December 18, 2021, we reoccupied many of the long vacant apartments in Habersaathstraße. Thus we have created living space, for people who need it just urgently!

Already a year ago, several apartments in Habersaathstraße 46 were occupied by homeless and homeless people. After several hours, the police brutally evicted the people back to the street before the seizure could be sufficiently checked by the district. Since then, not much has happened. The owner at the time, Andreas Pichotta, offered to make some of the vacant apartments available to an agency as cold aid. There were talks between the owner and a sponsor. The offer kept decreasing, out of 40, ten apartments remained, in the end there were no apartments at all.
[Read More]

London: Autonomous Winter Shelter opened in former St. Mungo’s hostel

Freedom has received the following communique:

There were over 2688 people recorded to be sleeping rough in London on any one night in 2020.

The temperature at night will be cold enough to cause hypothermia for 23 days this month. That’s 23 days where there’s a real possibility that someone sleeping on the street may not wake up.

It doesn’t have to be like this. [Read More]

Basel: House ok.cupied

This morning (November 30, 2021) early the collective okcupied Amerbachstrasse 63 in Basel. We are striving to help people find love and a home. We all know the feeling of emptiness. Because of Covid-19 the emptiness became even bigger and isolation became a daily reality for people. Especially the marginalized groups of our society are particularly affected because of the unjust structures of capitalism. Okcupied fights against this isolation and works to fill empty spaces with good vibes. Are you motivated? We’ll find the empty space that’s right for you.

You can find us on Telegram and Instagram:

t.me/okcupied

instagram.com/ok.cupied

Collective ok.cupied

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]

Pertuis (France): Opening of the ZAP

[Quick translation with the help of DeepL from fr.squat.net]: The extension of the commercial activity zone of Pertuis (84) threatens the neighbouring agricultural land, as well as the local inhabitants who risk expropriation. In order to prevent this harmful project, we decided to live in one of the houses destined to be destroyed, thus launching the Pertuis ZAP (Zone à patates).
[Read More]

Wageningen: Students squat demolition building

Wageningen (Netherlands) – A group of students announced today that they have squatted a building in the city center. During the housing crisis, they not only want to live there, but also create a cultural place where people can meet.

The building belongs to Zideris, a health organization that has had it empty for 5 years. In times of growing housing shortage and rising house prices, the students find it incomprehensible that usable living space remains unused for so long. Especially in Wageningen, where the university continues to expand and attract companies, insufficient solutions are offered for all those seeking housing. “Squatting can really be a solution to the housing crisis,” says one of the students. “It’s weird that a lot of buildings sit empty for years while a lot of people can’t find a house.” [Read More]

Utrecht: Squat on Croeselaan revealed during the Woonprotest demo

On Friday 19 November, an empty house on the Croeselaan was squatted. The squatters announced this during the Utrecht Housing Protest on Sunday 21 November. The squatting of the house is part of the national housing protest that speaks out against the current housing crisis. The squatters demand immediate action and do not want to wait for the empty promises of political parties and housing corporations.

During the demonstration, the squatters invited the demonstrators on the Jaarbeursplein to come and have coffee and tea at the new squat. The property on the Croeselaan had been vacant for a long time, while the blocks of social housing next to it are scheduled for demolition.

The squatters find it appalling that local political parties advocate the demolition of social housing, while further down the street, properties are unnecessarily empty. At the same time, there is an unprecedented housing crisis, which means that people in need of a house are on waiting lists, miss out on a house because investors outbid them and, if they do manage to get a house, have to work their asses off to pay the rent. [Read More]

Glasgow: Former homeless services unit reopened to house climate justice campaigners

Baile Hoose is the occupation of part of the former Hamish Allan Centre and asylum seeker’s night shelter, a Glasgow City Council property in Tradeston.

We’re a former homeless services unit in central Glasgow that’s been reopened to house climate justice campaigners visiting the city for the COP29 summit.
[Read More]

Amsterdam: Take back Mokum! Hotel Marnix squatted during ADEV

During the ADEV (Amsterdam Danst Ergens Voor) demonstration on 16 October 2021, former Hotel Marnix was squatted on Marnixstraat 382. Statement from Pak Mokum Terug! action group :

Amsterdam is in crisis. Housing is unaffordable. People with low and middle incomes are being chased out of the city. There is no room for young people. The commercialization of the center has attracted masses of tourists who make the city unlivable, while property owners, investors and large companies enrich themselves endlessly. There is no room for alternative culture. Amsterdam is losing its soul.

We, the collective Pak Mokum Terug! (Get Mokum Back!) are young Amsterdammers who have had enough. We no longer want to accept the trend that our city can only be inhabited by the rich. That economic and commercial interests are all-important. That we cannot shape our city, its culture, the way we live, ourselves. Therefore we claim the city, we claim the space for the people of Amsterdam, we take back Mokum. [Read More]