As the move towards the criminalisation of squatting continues in the UK with the House of Lords waving through the legislation, there have been demonstrations in support of squatting and autonomous spaces.
See below for reports from Brighton (today) and Bristol (yesterday).
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What a joke! All of it, the whole process. Last night the House of Lords passed a clause hidden in the legal aid bill to criminalise squatting in residential properties essentially making thousands of homeless people criminals overnight. A whole section of the very poorest and most vulnerable in society have been made criminals and again the debate took place extremely late in the day.
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“Elba lives! Elba stays! Stora Enso burn away!”
- report from the solidarity demonstration
A demonstration was organized in Helsinki, Finland on Thursday 22th of March against the destructive business of Stora Enso, and in solidarity with the squatters in Poland.
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Bryn Phillips, who is a British political prisoner, writes the following:
“Next week I’ll be sentenced in Wood Green Crown Court for my limited involvement in last summers riot in Hackney. I threw a Muller light yoghurt at a Police officer in full body armour and pushed over an empty milk trolley.”
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GONNA KEEP ELBA’S FIRES BURNING! ELBA STAYS!
Enough of turning lodgers and independent culture into the street!
It seems so natural. A corporation buys a ground and can do whatever it wants on it. Build a work, an office or a golf course. Nobody and nothing can stop that process…
But what if there is a cultural centre used by thousands of people and known all over Europe placed on that premises? What if social welfare is in conflict with company’s egoistic plans? A company, which piously advertises itself as “producing in conditions safe for the society and conducting dialogues with every side concerned”. Where is that dialogue? There’s no dialogue, there is, still, the rule of money. Stora Enso corporation is known for its uncompromised profit policy at the cost of people and the environment. [Read More]
On the 16th of March around 11am a group of workers from “Skrzecz” security agency entered unlawfully the premises of Elba, an alternative social centre in Warsaw. The security was hired by the landlord, the Finnish company Stora Enso. At this time there were several people on the ground who were beaten and forced out of the buildings. The security agents left a path of destruction inside the buildings and took away belongings of the residents of the squat. In the course of actions of the secutity agents money disappeared. This unlawful raid and illegal actions were actively supported by a group of police officers. As a matter of fact they made it impossible to defend against the agression of the security agents and did not react on countless incidents of breaking the law.
Today/now.., without warning, Elba squat in Warsaw is being violently evicted. Elba is the longest running and largest independent cultural center in Warsaw.
This is a part of a Polish live report, translated with g00gl, source: http://poland.indymedia.org/pl/2012/03/55240.shtml
Please share info if you know more!
In the afternoon of monday March 5th the tenants of a house at les Ardillières moved out and left the house to the Conseil général (the owner). Two hours later the CG had a company board up the house. A few squatters came by and decided to have a word with the workers. Three cops show up and the squatters decide to call their mates. About twenty people show up and decide to squat the house. The workers and cops move out and call backup. The police had their tires stabbed.
At 7 PM 5 sections of riot cops arrived (from the direction of la Paquelais) who escorted the local gendarmes who first beat everyone out the garden and next evicted the house violently. A physiongnomist called several people by their supposed names. Several people got injured. [Read More]
One of London’s largest and most active social centres was evicted Friday morning by around 100 police from the Territorial Support Group. According to reports, occupants were rudely awakened by an unruly mob of riot police breaking the inner door to their sleeping area. As no legal process had been initiated, an old warrant for the building was used as a pretext for the eviction. Occupants were in shock with the latest move by the authorities which allegedly defies nearly all the basic rights for every person to justice, as well as contravening Section 6 of the Criminal Law Act 1977.
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Please support the Tatekawa Tent Village by sending a message to the Koto Ward office to protest recent evictions.
The situation is dire and your responses could help prevent another eviction.
Please send faxes to the three parties listed below before the end of March.
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Since the last February14th, a vast strike movement is shaking the post-secondary studies sector (colleges and universities) in the province of Québec. This general strike movement, mostly lead by a left-wing coalition of student unions – the CLASSE (French acronym for Broad Coalition of the Association for Student Syndicalist Solidarity) – has set itself, as an immediate objective, the cancellation of the recent 25% tuition fees raise implemented by the neoliberal government of Québec, the second such raise in 4 years, after more than 15 years of tuition fee freezing. The movement is now 125,000 striking students strong and many strike votes will be held in the coming weeks by student assemblies. Many massive street demos gathering thousands of people, as well as blockade actions have been organized, triggering more and more police repression.
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“Zadruga Urbana” is a group of people who came together with the shared dissatisfaction for the current system of food production, who believe in the necessity for a collective movement to take the process into their own hands. We believe that collective gardens raise people’s awareness of producing their own food, consuming locally and being autonomous/productive, enabling individuals without land of their own to produce food with a sensitivity for their local natural environment.
Our group wants to bring people together to learn and promote the ideas to find solutions for change towards a more sustainable life regardless of previous experience. Everyone is welcome to participate in our gardens and network, to learn and share the skills of producing our own food. We aim to use local seeds and to fertilize our crop naturally. [Read More]
