Barcelona: Sara released with charges. Freedom for 27F prisoners. Enough of police set-ups

By: fawda - March 23rd, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

Yesterday, monday March 22, at the last minute, we received the news of the release (with charges) of Sara, one of the eight imprisoned for the demonstration on 27 February in Barcelona. The appeal lodged by the defence would prove, by means of expert evidence, that it could not have been her who sprayed flammable liquid, as the police statement claimed.

Once again, this story, with its categorical assertions, reproduced by so many media outlets, is beginning to fade. Sara was arrested, charged and imprisoned as the perpetrator of the van fire without the right to the presumption of innocence. Just like the rest of the people arrested and today imprisoned.

Sara’s photo, her name and details appeared in the media, first in La Vanguardia, echoed by the Italian press. A few days before she was due to serve a month in prison, she was released with charges after her lawyer and an expert witness for the defence proved that it was impossible that she was the person accused by the police, the public prosecutor and the court. [Read More]

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Bristol: ‘Burn Baby Burn!’

By: fawda - March 22nd, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

The chant goes up into the air as the flames of the cop van rise higher and higher, burning away a pressure that has been building for far too long.
The cop station’s windows are kicked in to the roaring joy of the crowd, its raining rocks from above on the riot cops from youths who’ve occupied part of its roof. Repeated attacks on the cop lines are visibly putting the fear into them. Bottles rain down on the cop dog unit’s failed attempt to assault the mob from behind. Riot shields and batons liberated from the cops are used to fight back, a piece of their own medicine. Others are caring for people sprayed with mace, while sound systems ring out. Another cop car is burning round the corner, this is like nothing we have seen before…

This is the scene in Bristol in 2021, 10 years since the Stokes Croft & August riots in 2011. The riot that erupted last night was a continuation of our combative memories, but from seeing so many new young uncontrollables it is the beginning of a new wave. Nothing much has changed on this prison island since 2011, if anything the conditions that led to those days are still with us, more repressive than ever. We’re being pushed over the edge, as the system of control demands either lick the boot or have our way of life extinguished. [Read More]

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Briançon: 3+4+2 trial – Call for support, call for mobilisation

By: fawda - March 20th, 2021  Filed under: News

Spring 2021 will be marked by two political trials, criminalising solidarity with exiles and people without documents.
On 22 April at the court of Gap, two solidarity activists will be tried in the first instance for “aiding the entry and circulation on national territory of people in an irregular situation”. They were arrested on 19 November while helping an Afghan family on French territory.
On 27 May, the “7 of Briançon” were appealed following their conviction on 13 December 2018. They were sentenced in the first instance to up to four months in prison and eight months suspended for participating in an anti-fascist/no border demonstration on 22 April 2018. This spontaneous demonstration aimed to denounce (with the practice) the action of the fascist group Génération Identitaire present the day before at the Echelle pass (Hautes Alpes) and the big militarisation of these days of the border which puts lives in danger. [Read More]

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Berlin: Demo Freedom for all prisoners affected by repression in Barcelona

By: fawda - March 17th, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

Monday 22 March 2021, 16:00
Meeting point: Delegació del Govern a Alemanya
Regierung von Katalonien – Vertretung in Deutschland, Friedrichstrasse, 185. 10117 Berlin

On February 27, 2021, 8 anarchist comrades* were arrested during the riots in Barcelona, as a result of the protests that have been going on since the arrest of Pablo Hasél. All of them are currently in pre-trial detention without bail. They are accused of criminal organization, attempted murder, unlawful demonstration, attack on authority, damage and public disorder. All this as a consequence of a fire being set at one of the vans of the riot police of the Guardia Urbana of Barcelona, a police organization that has a long history of torture and violence. The media, as a propaganda tool of the State, are justifying the repression against our comrades and infusing fear to stop self-organization and dismantle the protests.

After the Pandora and Piñata police set-ups, it is obvious that we are once again facing an operation to repress an ideological current contrary to capitalist interests. They are condemned because they are anarchists. In this type of set-up, the accusation of belonging to a criminal organization or terrorism is something that is being used to create an internal enemy and justify repression. This allows them to judicialize our lives through police harassment, raids, violation of our personal and political spaces, visits to penitentiary centers, etc. Through this they intend to wear us down psychologically and economically, and thus disarticulate our struggles. [Read More]

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Berlin: statement about the 8 arrested anarchists in Barcelona

By: fawda - March 10th, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

On February 27th, 2021, 8 anarchist comrades* from Italy, France and Spain were arrested during the riots in Barcelona stemming from the protests that have been taking place since the arrest of Pablo Hasél on February 16th. All are currently in pre-trial detention without bail in Brians I prison (Catalonia). The serving judge of the 17th Court of Barcelona charged them with belonging to a criminal organization, attempted murder, participation in an illegal demonstration, resistance to state authority, damage to property and disturbance of public order.
All this happened as a result of a vehicle being set on fire which belonged to the riot police of the Guardia Urbana of Barcelona, a police force that has a long history of torture and indiscriminate violence against migrants and homeless people (1) and which the mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau (Barcelona en Comú) promised to disband during the 2015 municipal elections (2). However as we can see, they are still there.

All these accusations are accompanied by a propaganda apparatus provided by the media, which, as a tool of the state, justifies the repression against our comrades* and sparks a climate of fear in order to crush the protests. [Read More]

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Barcelona: Solidarity with the detainees of the 27F demonstration

By: fawda - March 9th, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

Communiqué: The press targets… About the 8 people accused of burning a police van.

On 27 February, 8 of our comrades were arrested in the centre of Barcelona during a demonstration. This event is part of a series of mass mobilisations called in the name of freedom of expression but which have ended up increasingly taking on the voice of general dissent against the historical period we are living through. A suffocating reality characterised by unprecedented institutional violence, which leaves the majority of the population without a future and which absolves and defends the usual criminals: the police, politicians and the royal family.

Following their arrests, police searches took place in 2 houses in Maresme, with the intention of linking our comrades with alleged non-existent criminal organisations and with disproportionate accusations based on derisory evidence. There is no presumption of innocence, the written statement of the Mossos has been reproduced in all the media, which repeat it and assume it as their own. In turn, the court does what was already written: very serious charges and pre-trial detention without bail. We see no other sense in all this than to put an end to the wave of protests that has been growing exponentially throughout Catalonia for weeks. [Read More]

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Barcelona: solidarity with the arrested anarchist comrades!

By: fawda - March 5th, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

8 of our comrades have been remanded in custody for the night of the 3rd of March 2021! The judge on duty of the court #17 of Barcelona accuses them of public disorder, attempted homicide, organized criminal group, illegal demonstration; according to the press (i.e. the Mossos, Catalan police) they would be responsible for all the riots and vandalism that have taken place since February 16th, including the burning of the police van on the Rambla on Saturday, February 27th. Currently the comrades are in quarantine-isolation in the prison of Brians I, in Martorell.

The real problem is that they are anarchists and they have shown it with their participation in the demonstration in solidarity with Pablo Hasel on Saturday 27th, called by the CUP (Candidatura d’Unitat Popular, left-wing Catalan independence party), like thousands of other people. What they didn’t know or ignored was that some of their enemies had them in their sights because of events 4 years ago in Girona*. This is a threat to many of us who are anti-authoritarian and have never hidden it! [Read More]

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Catalonia: eight arrested and squats raided

By: fawda - March 3rd, 2021  Filed under: News

An anarchist group would be, according to the Mossos, the main responsible for the riots in Barcelona for the freedom of Pablo Hasel. Faced with the wide social response, especially among the youth, to the aberrant imprisonment of the rapper Pablo Hasel, the Catalan police already have those responsible, the scapegoats whom they intend to criminalize for social mockery and to hide, by the way, the brutal abuses committed by the riot police (a demonstrator loosing her eye, massive beating in Gràcia…).

Undoubtedly, they will continue to count on the overwhelming support of a political (central and regional governments), judicial and media apparatus that, as good servants of the economic powers, are interested in diverting attention from the real causes of the mobilizations, such as the growing authoritarianism and repression of the State (the scandalous imprisonment of Hasel is the umpteenth case), the rampant corruption, with the Bourbons at the head, or the social exclusion and lack of prospects in the face of an increasingly predatory capitalism. [Read More]

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Brussels: the municipality chooses repression and lies rather than solidarity

By: fawda - March 1st, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

Press release – Solidarity Requisitioning Campaign

On Friday 26th February we wanted to squat the old Pacheco Hospice in the city centre. Our action clearly did not please the municipal politicians – Khalid Zian, president of the CPAS (Centres Publics d’Action Sociale) and Philippe Close, mayor of the City of Brussels – who opted for violent repression rather than negotiation. In the evening, we were bluntly kicked out by the police. 38 people were detained for several hours and will be fined. People were kicked in the head and verbally abused. We wonder where such a strong reaction against a solidarity action that has been rather well received in other municipalities and by the region in recent weeks comes from. Why does the city of Brussels not want to allow the use of a CPAS building that has been empty for 4 years to house people in difficulty?

The CPAS justifies the eviction by the fact that a temporary occupation is currently being considered and that a public call for tenders will soon be launched. Khalid Zian, the president of the CPAS, goes so far as to falsely assert that an occupation for accommodation would have been possible “on condition that it was properly supervised and agreed upon beforehand”. However, the municipal authorities have been approached several times about this building (by the Voice of the Undocumented – la Voix des Sans Papiers – already 2 years ago, by the Region this winter for emergency accommodation) and have each time refused to make the building available. [Read More]

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Angers: eviction of the Grande Ourse and nazi attack, the city where it is good to live

By: fawda - January 23rd, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

On Thursday, January 21, 2021, in the middle of winter, the forces of law and order and the prefecture proceeded to evict the Grande Ourse squat, a place of militancy and solidarity. It housed many homeless people, students, the working poor … The issues of poverty, equality, solidarity, were at the center of the actions carried out by its activists, they regularly organized rounds to distribute food to people on the streets. People from outside the city could also get together, there were regular cultural events, film screenings, debates… But what is the problem, at a time when students in Angers are facing a housing shortage, at a time when the covid-19 crisis is plunging an increasingly large proportion of young workers into poverty? The problem is that these activists are holding a political discourse, that by occupying an unused building the holiness of private property has been called into question. That’s unacceptable, we don’t question that, especially when that questioning benefits people who don’t intend to use it for capitalist ends, especially when it benefits people who advocate values other than competition and individual financial enrichment. So here we are, the prefecture will return the furniture store to its legitimate owner. He will be able to put back beds where no one will ever sleep or make other projects allowing him to increase his capital a little more. [Read More]

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Ljubljana: Stop demolishing autonomous spaces, everyone come to ROG

By: fawda - January 20th, 2021  Filed under: Communique, News

Call for solidarity

Comrades! Many of you have stayed, fought and loved one of the two squats in Ljubljana. For 15 years Rog was a centre of political activity in the city and in the international movements. Today 19 January 2021, Rog factory was brutally evicted. Many of our comrades were violently beaten and arrested. We are calling for solidarity all around the world. Let’s show the oppressors of all kinds they are messing with the wrong movement!

Statement of Rog factory about eviction

Today, at 7 in the morning, employees of the security company Valina have forcefully entered the spaces of Autonomous factory Rog. Violently, using physical force, they injured some of its users and evicted everybody. Our personal belongings, pets and valuable equipment were left inside, together with 15 years of our dreams, activities, projects, adventures and common experiences. Police has erected fences around Rog and started to beat supporters gathering in support in front of the factory’s gate. In the inside of the complex workers have demolished majority of side structures and smashed windows on the main building that is protected as heritage. At the same time they are taking away, on the unknown location, all the equipment from Rog. More then 10 persons were held in custody, among them some of the injured that need medical help. We do not have access to them and we don’t have information on where all of them were taken. [Read More]

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Greece: New Year’s Notes under Lockdown

By: fawda - January 20th, 2021  Filed under: News

At this time, we are reminded of our comrades through banners and graffiti, through brief encounters under the guise of getting exercise between curfews, and through the courageous actions of those who turn to the night to act as the day becomes too dangerous.
The anarchist movement in Greece is among the largest in the world, proportionate to the population. However, we are now experiencing unprecedented repression as a result of the pandemic and resulting political opportunism. We remain stagnated in lockdown, overwhelmed by the reign of the right and its defenders. Ecocide, social control, new crackdowns on universities, and general repression of those excluded from or deemed enemies of the Greek state continue to expand in the shadow of COVID-19.
We will highlight a few recent incidents of concern relating to the solidarity efforts essential for the global anarchist movement. We sometimes struggle to write these updates, not wishing to simply present a monthly bulletin on depression from Greece. We write from a perspective that many people here share, best summarized by this comment that captures the theme of so many interactions here: “Some days good, some days bad. Just feel stuck, and not even sure what I’m waiting for.”
During this enforced pause in our lives, those who hold power are rushing through policies and automation disguised as pandemic response. This is part of a broader effort to gentrify Greek society. [Read More]

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