Let’s set up barricades of solidarity against the nation and the state

“The issue of migration is an issue with national implications. Therefore, it is important to exchange views and positions despite ideological and political differences.”

Minister of Migration, N. Mitarakis, after his meeting with a delegation of SYRIZA, 06.02.2020

“They are right to close the borders, we did it, too—but without a parade.”

Al. Tsipras, 02.03.2020

“We expressed our concern with Turkish aggressiveness and provocation, which is combined with new asymmetrical threats, provocations with the refugee–migrant currents to Evros and the islands of the Aegean.”

Koutsoumpas, 06.03.2020

 

The wars of the bosses and states have always been directed against the exploited and the oppressed of this world, beyond the borders built on bloodshed. Wars that serve either the political or economic goals of the bosses — such as energy, the development of the weapons industry, and control over geostrategic areas — have been going on for years in various places across the planet (Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, etc.) with the active participation of the Greek state. These wars, as well as the human desire for a better life, push millions of people to abandon their homes. The latest events at Evros and the Aegean have resulted in hundreds of migrants trying to cross the borders and having to deal with the full apparatus of the state and parastate. These institutions sink boats laden with passengers (drowning a 6-year-old child), shoot with live ammunition resulting in two murders so far, choke people with chemicals, set up racist blockades in the ports and streets, and plan and execute pogroms in Chios and Lesvos. These actions are accompanied by jingoistic appeals for “national unity” against the “invasion”, both institutional and popular in nature.

 

The state, with the friendly cooperation of the media, refers to the movement of migrants in the language of war, describing it as an “asymmetrical threat“, and in so doing seeks to foster greater unity and participation of patriots and nationalists of this society in the crimes of the Greek state. This is not the first time that the Greek state has talked and acted in military terms against migrants. The decision to suspend the acceptance of asylum applications and to serve immediate sentences of 4 years’ imprisonment and a €10,000 fine those who have crossed the borders is wholly based on this fascistic rhetoric.

 

Announcements about the creation of more detention centres are nothing but a clear message about the continuation of the war on migrants. When the Greek state talks about a solution, we can be sure that what this implies for migrants is more violence and isolation, more deportations, greater restrictions on movement and more cruel exploitation, impoverishment, and death. The financial aid of €700mn it received from the EU reflects this criminal bargain that’s happening over control of the migrant population. A bargain that’s not just about the profit of capital that is involved in operations related to migration, but one that is being spread to the level of local society.

 

In this unequal war, those sitting at the negotiating table have always been clustered on the same side. The anti-migration policy of the Greek state, in which it has decades of experience, is being implemented as a national affair beyond “ideological and political differences“. For years it has been using a range of tools which are modified and developed with an ideological emphasis on the superiority of the Greek element that is under threat. Even its humanitarian side follows this rule. The left-wing government of SYRIZA has opened the way and affirmed in the best possible way the practical meaning of national unity.

 

For this reason, the riots, protests, and refusals of migrants, from Moria to Petrou Ralli, are a part of the struggle against constant humiliation and violence they receive. These are struggles against the degradation and isolation they’re being put through in each aspect of everyday life. The imprisonment of thousands of people in detention centres, just because they have a different place of origin, doesn’t need to happen in these horrible conditions to be seen as what it is: pure fascism.

 

The escalation of the military handling of migration comes together with attacks against squats, starvation wages, expensive rents, the cops’ intensive patrols and ID checks in squares, parks, and universities. The bosses’ proclamation about a return to “normality” requires the consolidation of state power and business interests. 

 

Our cities are changing, and in the interest of the bosses. “Modern prisons” are no longer a slogan, but they’re being built, refined and normalised every day around us. They’re becoming an asphyxiating reality where there’s only space for the intensification of exploitation and consumption. It’s this reality that we need to attack collectively.

 

AGAINST WAR, RACISM, EXPLOITATION, AND OPPRESSION

TEAR DOWN THE BORDERS AND CONCENTRATION CAMPS

 

against the criminalisation of migration

 

papers to all migrants

free movement

 

common struggles of locals & migrants for a world of equality and freedom

 

Short update, some comments and a call for an assembly.

After the events in Koukaki and the cops’ attacks on Sunday in Evelpidon, all of the arrestees were brought back to court today 13/1. Although their trials had been set for 11. 00 am (for the arrestees of 12/1) and 1:00 pm (for the arrestees of 11/1) there was a wait until roughly 7:30 in the evening in an outrageous attempt to exhaust the accused, their lawyers, and the about 150 solidarians who remained tirelessly outside the building until about 9 pm. It goes without saying that the MAT guards never stopped provoking the comrades throughout it all. The charges, despite the prosecutors’ insistence on the contrary, are all small and include disobedience, resisting authority and serious bodily harm. The arrestees finally had their trials postponed for January 22, 23, and 24, and were all released. The solidarians—who had been shouting slogans this entire time—welcomed them with celebration and cries of joy.

In this atmosphere, and parallel to the court cases, we were not surprised by the unprecedented slander of our comrades, the media war that targeted them, and the plain lies about the events that were thrown around by the gutter press of the left and right wing, taken straight from GADA headquarters. The usual recipe was complete on the channels with the stereotypical statements of some “frustrated residents” of Koukaki, the lament of syndicalist cops about the “anarchists’ murderous desires” and their destroyed equipment, and plenty of the famous terror–hysteria sauce—aimed clearly at convincing that the charges need to be “upgraded” to felonies.

However, it’s hard to reverse the atmosphere in favour of the cops, the state and its spies, or to whitewash their humiliation. The image of dozens of OPKE (forming a “turtle” in Roman legion style) trying to evade the righteous “fire” of our comrades (which were cooking pots, books, guitars, flowerpots and anything they had handy) will be hard to erase from the memory of whoever had the pleasure to watch the corresponding videos.

The image of a handful of free people thrashing an entire army of fully armed, machist, hired state murderers can only serve to remind us that all of us together can reach to the skies .

Our dreams are going to be their worst nightmares!

We call tomorrow (Tuesday 14/1) at 19:00 to Gini for updates from our released comrades and discussion of our next actions.

This New Year , we break the status of invisibility and show our solidarity outside the hellhole of Petrou Ralli

petrouRalli

Detention centres, Petrou Ralli, just like every prison, are one of the means used by the state to throw aside those it can’t or won’t assimilate and use, to punish those who disturb, to set an example for those who are still dreaming of living with dignity and freedom.

Migrants there are imprisoned in inhumane conditions with no contact with the outside world. Their full isolation from society gives their jailers the freedom to physically and psychologically abuse them non-stop. They are denied access to food, healthcare, information, human contact and basic dignity. Their very life and existence becomes disposable in the devaluation they are living in.

Imprisoned and free people are separated by a wall, and the side we’re on is just a matter of luck or bad luck, as well as the result of the state’s current plans. Hundreds of prisoners inside Petrou Ralli are hit by the same system of oppression as us who are going to be outside the hellhole on Tuesday night to change the year with them.

We call to a gathering outside Petrou Ralli detention centre on the night of New Year’s Eve, Tuesday 31/12.

Pregathering at St. Annis square at 23:30.

Access by buses 838, Β18, Γ18 and trolley 21 from Omonia.

We also support the calls for a gathering outside Korydallos prison.

– Solidarity to migrants

– No person invisible, no person in the hands of the state

– Until the tearing down of every detention centre and prison

Debriefing text of counterculture events at Exarchia square (22/12)

On Sunday, December 22nd, we organised a day-long event at Exarchia square, in answer to the preannounced municipal event–front for oppression that was to take place at noon of the same day.

The municipality of Athens under Bakoyannis plays a central part in selling out our neighbourhoods and answers every attempt of resistance with more and more repression. In Exarchia, it tries to camouflage the repression and gentrification of the neighbourhood that translates into shops, the metro, raises in rent, a sterilised and controlled environment, with superficial events and actions accompanied by the media twisting the story and armed goons. It wants to impose its superiority by cleaning the square, where it removes our posters and our speech from the neighbourhood and as a symbol of its domination it pins down a tree, like in a conquered space. We view this event as one more aggressive act of political and cultural distortion of the ground of Exarchia, one that we had to answer by cancelling it through our active presence throughout the day. We couldn’t allow this fiesta of hypocrisy, where there wouldn’t have been space for us, anyway.

At the dawn of 22/12, 50 comrades reached the square to prepare the ground for an event made by the ones below for the ones below. Suddenly the square came to life with a collective breakfast, coffee, tables with political material and zines, a free shop for clothes and creative activities with children. A moment of tension in the morning was the passing of 5 Delta motorbikes that were checking out the movement in the square before disappearing towards themistokleous—the last insecurity force we saw during the event.

As noon was approaching, when the municipal event was set to take place, people flooded the square supporting the event with their presence. There was a microphonic that filled the square with anticommercial music, a free book shop, and all that next to and in collaboration with the market of the square and the self-organised bazaar of Stray Exarchia. At the same time, Mano Aperta collective was making a collective meal with free contribution for the people present at the event. An open discussion was started about the university, asylum, education, business and gentrification by the Libertarian group of the philosophy department. Meanwhile, artistic activities were continuing with the decoration of the burnt tree. On the tree we hung our messages, which the state wants to erase.

On the way to the afternoon, the screening of the documentary on gentrification and short-term leasing didn’t happen due to the weather and other technical difficulties. But the rebetiko did take place, to close the night in the same climate of comradeship and companionship as the rest of the day. Comrades also made a festive addition to the statue in the centre of the square, placing a large, bright circle A on top of it.

The celebration had a very good atmosphere, with everyone getting closer (and not just the anarchists). Adults and children, locals and migrants, residents and regulars of the square celebrated together trying to not reproduce hierarchies and oppressions. Our presence there left no room for those who oppress: state and capitalists, sexists and fascists. For example, a bookshop owner from the neighbourhood who is known for his gentrification efforts, his flexible understanding of workers’ hours, and his participation in various commercial fiestas in the square wasn’t able to set up his stalls.

From next year, we’ll be here every day!

CALL TO THE DEMO IN SOLIDARITY WITH ASOEE STEKI ON FRIDAY 15/11

Recently, the state’s repressive campaign against squatted houses has become almost a normality. The pattern is obvious, migrant squats and spaces with diverse political activity and anti authoritarian characteristics are evicted one after the other.

Within this context, on Sunday 10/11/19 the ASOEE steki was attacked by cops and evicted early in the morning while the university was still empty. This move was followed by police orders to lock out the entire school until November 17, in an attempt by the cops to suppress political action generally within the university. The dean of the school, Emmanuel Yakoumakis, has once again shown, after the eviction of the Vancouver squat, how much he defends the state and its minions.

As long as the cops try through a series of repressive actions to terrorize the struggling part of society, the dominant propaganda on its part is trying in every way to demonize it in the public sphere. Their attitude is does not come as a surprise to us.

For us every squatted house and every “steki” is a space of ​​struggle, a space where we can defend ourselves politically by building relationships of solidarity, trust and resistance, far from individualism and capitalistic misery. It is within these squats and places that our ideas become materialized. As for our “demonization” the only thing we have to say is that we are and intend to remain dangerous for the state,the property,  all the business interests and the normality of Greek society in general.

EVERYONE IN THE DEMONSTRATION ON FRIDAY 15/11 AT 18:00 AT PLATEIA AMERIKIS

SOLIDARITY TO SQUATS, SPACES OF STRUGGLE AND MIGRANTS

STATE AND BOSSES ARE THE ONLY TERRORISTS

Open assembly of squats, collectives, internationalists, migrants and solidarians

ABOUT THE ABDUCTION OF MIGRANT -CHILDREN FROM SCHOOLS IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF EXARCHEIA

Early on Monday of 23/09/19, the New Democracy government proceeded to evacuate another migrant squat. This last evacuation adds up to a number of previous others, with many migrant squats targeted, launched under the SIRIZA government, with a large number of children among the ‘abducted’ residents.These children, infants, toddlers, elementary and teenagers were until yesterday studying with our children in the local schools, playing in the parks and squares with them and developing relations with the local community. Now they are scattered in various concentration camps in the continent or on the streets, with no access to basic amenities and some of them may even be under the threat of deportation.

At the same time the neighborhood of Exarcheia, for more than a month, reminds us of occupied territories with all kinds of repressive forces lined up around the clock in the streets and squares of the area. Every morning, on the road to work, on the way to school, and even during Saturday’s market, we are confronted with armed squads of riot police (MAT and OPKE). There is an attempt at a local scale to consolidate the police forces as normal while at the same time the people of the neighborhood are excluded from it and are forced to adapt to the new situation. The “normality” of repression accompanies the “normality” of misery as any development is built on our already undervalued lives.

Schools in Exarcheia, after much effort by both teachers and many local parents, have in the recent years sought to provide a perspective for the inclusion of migrant children into the local community. Their violent removal from their neighborhood, school, and social context not only targets these children themselves but also targets the local children who are left behind. When one morning your classmate is no longer next to you on the desk and you learn that she or he has been taken to a concentration camp, you are in fact urged to accept that this classmate as a migrant and squatter was illegal and criminal. You are called upon to accept the fascist practice of racial segregation and racism as normal, at a fragile age in which experiences and situations are the solid base concerning your evolution as a person. The joint struggle of teachers, parents and pupils in Exarcheia neighborhood to include migrant children into local society should set an example that transcends Exarcheia’s boundaries and act as a guide for children around the world as it is them who are about to change the future practically challenging racism and intolerance. It is this prospect of contestation that the state is trying to uproot by all means, with the constant attacks on migrant pupils as well as with the evacuation of squats and all kinds of violent interventions aimed at displacing the inhabitants of a whole neighborhood and replace them with consumers, tourists and individuals from the upper classes.

From our point of view, these attacks are part of the widespread and multidimensional attack that we are experiencing aimed to turn the whole territory into an easily exploitable territory for domestic and foreign capital. The implementation of this conversion requires the discipline of workers, unemployed, pupils, students, migrants, women and LGBTQI+, the imprisonment of those who are in rebellion, and the militarization of public space. We intend to respond by all means to this attack.

We were delighted and pleased to read the announcements of some parents associations in the area, as well as some teachers, who publicly opposed to the abduction of migrant pupils from Exarcheia schools. We believe that when such fascist outbursts appear, everyone, parents, teachers, pupils should take a stand not only in Exarcheia but in all schools and neighborhoods.

Open assembly of squats, collectives, internationalists,
migrants and solidarians

SOLIDARITY DEMONSTRATION FOR MIGRANTS AND SPACES OF STRUGGLE AGAINST THE STATE AND CAPITALIST DEVELOPMENT (political frame)

If you are a migrant…

Migrants are undervalued and attacked in all aspects of their lives. They follow the path of migration to escape war, poverty, and sometimes because of a desire for a better life. Wars are fomented by bosses and their states to serve either their political or economic goals – the exploitation of mineral resources, the development of the arms industry, the control of geostrategic locations. A concrete example is the Greek state, which together with its allies is currently participating in aerial combat operations in Afghanistan, while it also took part in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which continues to this day, and triggered a resurgence of the chaos of war in the Middle East.

As they travel, migrants encounter murderous border regimes of which in recent years states have been tightening the control, closing safe passages and pushing people to even more dangerous routes. They are forced to handover their life savings to networks of people smugglers and risk drowning due to poor weather conditions or inadequate means of transport. There are recorded incidents where border police have attacked, pushed back, or even worse, sunk migrant boats. Even if they make it past this, the hellholes of Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, and Libya await them.

Initially, “hotspots” filter the population by collecting their personal data and then categorising it according to nationality and other arbitrary factors. The process ends with imprisonment or confinement to concentration camps that are guarded by the police and army. Thousands of people who share common characteristics, such as immigration, place of origin and difficult economic situations are crammed in the same space. These so-called “Hosting Structures” have clear racist and classist characteristics that are most harshly reflected in their living conditions. Such conditions consist of being housed in metal containers that become virtual ovens in the summer or in tents that become sodden and submerged in the winter, inadequate food to maximise contractors’ profits, and lack of basic health care and medication to the extent that creates a serious risk of mass infection or disease. Worst of all however is the loss of freedom, which is accompanied by indefinite detention, constant checks, and restrictions on movement.

The next test migrants face is the ongoing war by the cops in the neighbourhoods in which they live and work. Murders and beatings in police stations, ID checks and arrests that result in long-term detentions, disappearances and deportations. We will not forget the Nigerian, Ebuka, who was tortured to death inside Omonia police station in February 2019, nor the eight Algerians who ended up with broken limbs at the hands of the fascist guards in Petrou Ralli detention centre in 2018.

At work they are endlessly exploited, as they constitute the most invisible class of workers. The devaluation of their work is accompanied by total or partial exclusion from education, health and general public services. The work of migrants in Greece evokes similar practices in the 90s characterised by degrading wages, work on the black market and employer terrorism. Bosses take advantage of undocumented migrants for further exploitation. They create a state of fear attempting to suppress resistance by such means as calling the cops when the time comes to pay their salaries or maintaining a constant turnover of employees. On the other hand, there is the employer tactic of Manolada for the case of migrants with papers.

The war on migrants is organised by bosses and states who utilize inherently racist and nationalist myths in order to maintain and perpetuate exploitation. For example, the mainstream media today conceals the fact that since mid-2015 the number of new migrants in Greece is only 60,000, and their numbers remain constant. Instead, they propagate racist, nationalist, and militaristic propaganda all day with headlines like “invasion,” “landing” and “there’s no more room”. Obviously for us it is not a question of “room”, since we know that in our neighborhoods and our cities, there is room for all the oppressed and resisting people in the world.

Concentration camps as a national industry

Equally high on the agenda of the bosses’ political representatives is the continuation of the previous government’s policy of further developing the migrant concentration camp industry, with the creation of four new camps in the Attica region. A national industry that makes profits for private companies (NGOs), the Greek army (50% of migrants are now under the management of the army following the Mouzalas-Kammenos inter-ministerial agreement), catering bosses, security companies, property owners and various traffickers; that is to say, representatives of the inner core of the state.

At the same time, the NGO industry, operating both inside and outside the concentration camps, has become one of the most profitable and fastest growing for Greek capitalism. There is a raging conflict between the Greek and Turkish states over which warden will make the most profits from European Union people-guarding funds.

In March 2016 the EU decided to assign to Turkey the role of chief warden for its future workforce and signed the well-known EU-Turkey deal, while retaining other agreements with Greece, Egypt, Libyan tribal leaders, and others. For this reason, we believe that the demand for the annulment of the EU-Turkey agreement is about inter-state competition, rather than our class struggle.

These European states policies of illegalization and subjugation are used all over the world, for example by US capitalism towards workers from Latin America, and by Chinese capitalism after it has declared internal immigration illegal.

Resistance and Squatting as Means Of Resistance

In the face of these conditions migrants resist and rebel. They protest and set fire to the hellholes of Petrou Ralli, Samos, and Moria, they escape, occupy highways and trains, they camp at borders and clash with repressive forces of the state. And whenever they have the opportunity, they leave the concentration camps to return to the urban fabric, where they build their relationships in both social contexts and the work space. In urban centers they do a variety of jobs and sometimes fight to defend these only means of survival, such as the ASOEE peddlers’ joint struggle with anarchist-antiauthoritarian students.

They use and participate in the solidarity structures of the movement for housing and organising their lives in communities without terrorist control by the state. Such were Spyrou Trikoupi 15 Transito, Spyrou Trikoupi 17, the 2nd and 5th School and the most recently evicted squat Oneiro, as well as the dozens of squats evicted by Syriza, such as Azadi, New Babylon and Clandestina. These solidarity structures were located in the city near people, means of transport and communication, schools, and services needed by migrants to navigate the bureaucratic maze imposed by the state.

Squats, stekia (social spaces) and spaces of struggle in general, are multi-ethnic communities that in addition to housing migrants organise collective kitchens, medical centres, the supply of clothing and other essentials, self-organised classes, theatres, concerts, food production, and the collection of money and essentials for prisoners. These are communities that aspire to be shelters from domestic violence, patriarchy, and economic and political control of the state.

Beyond everyday needs and social structures, squats, social spaces and more generally spaces of struggle, are places for meeting and organizing for hundreds of oppressed, exploited and people in struggle. In squats such as the recently evicted Gare, Villa Amalias some years ago, and the majority of occupations in Greece, the voice of anarchist-antiauthoritarian militants and class consciousness germinates and is cultivated. In these spaces, actions against the state, capitalist and patriarchal interests are planned; and initiatives and collectives are created. The proliferation of squats reflects the rejection of the institution of private property, while at the same time their existence embodies this rejection. They support and nourish the revolutionary ideal that proclaims that the forces of the working classes and marginalized are able to expropriate buildings, occupy territories and build a life without state, capital, and patriarchy.

The fields of social/class struggle are not just in the defense of squats and social spaces. Squares and neighborhoods like Exarchia, whole places like Lefkimi and Skouries, schools and universities, are places where people fight against disastrous development plans and demarcate lines of defense against the armies of the state. That is why the spaces of struggle constitute a barrier to capitalist designs, and that is why the state has always tried to suppress them and discipline our own bodies. Fighters frustrate the efforts of the bosses and the state and leave an important legacy for the resistance of the future.

Growth means Devious Displacement

From Agrafa to Chania, from the center of Athens to the furthest island, the capitalist and state machinery is in the process of reorganising, promoting highly destructive development plans for both the environment and our neighborhoods. The renewable energy industry shaves and tears the mountains to build wind turbines, Pharaohnic projects that will last for a few years before becoming nothing but trash on a dead landscape. Works like the dam on the river Acheloos that is threatens to eradicate an entire village. Huge drills open deep wounds into the earth and the sea to absorb further fuels and minerals.

Beyond the plunder of nature, much of society is threatened as our neighborhoods are slowly being transformed into tourist resorts. The phenomenon of AirBnB, along with the material interests of landlords, are driving up rents while wages are kept to a minimum. The new conditions make us unable to meet the financial pressures and we are forced to abandon our neighbourhoods. Living costs are rising and our working future is reduced in the galley of the tourist industry, without even being able to live in the very neighborhoods in which we work. With the full support and involvement of the Municipality of Athens and local institutions of each area, our neighborhoods become advertising products and prey for the appetites of small or large bosses. At the same time, cop rule is stepping up to protect the smooth circulation of goods and to give businesspeople and consumers a sense of security. From the city to the countryside and from the islands to the mountains, the whole country is a construction site and centre of consumerism.

A holistic plan of state repression and capitalist development demands that we accept police rule and the standard of living that our bosses want to impose on us as normal.

As for Us

In the face of this, we respond that the class of oppressed and people in struggle can live and organise their lives without the oppression and exploitation of the state, capital, and patriarchy. Collectively organised into communities, neighborhood assemblies, and grassroots unions, with solidarity and self-defense structures, we can draw multiple strengths, resist, and brake the machines of social submission. Let’s not forget that all power and knowledge is in the hands of the exploited, and, together with the desire for creativity and freedom we can shoot for the sky.

– UNITED LOCAL AND MIGRANT STRUGGLES WITHOUT NATIONAL DIVISION

– NO TOLERANCE FOR CONCENTRATION CAMPS, PAPERS TO ALL MIGRANTS

– AGAINST THE DEVALUATION OF OUR LIVES AND THE DISPLACEMENT OF OUR BODIES

– AGAINST THE STATE, CAPITAL AND PATRIARCHY FOR SOCIAL AND CLASS FREEDOM

IF YOU ARE A MIGRANT: THIS IS GREECE, THIS IS EUROPE

If you are a migrant in Greece you probably know quite well already how difficult life is in this country for those not born here. You know that even if one reaches the borders of Europe – and escapes the poverty and war stoked in Asia and Africa by small and large bosses – one must risk his or her own life. You also know already that those who do eventually find themselves in Europe are not treated by the state and its governments as people in need, but rather are stacked into camps and prisons, without food, medicine, heating, education, and the freedom to go where they want.

But even those who manage to avoid or leave the camps and prisons are living in a state of fear. They worry constantly about their papers, and do not know when the police might stop them on the street to search them – and possibly beat, arrest, and deport them. When they manage to find work they perform the most difficult jobs without insurance and for far less money than other people. They are often confronted with the murderous sentiments of fascists and racists. Their children are not treated as equal to other children in school. They have no security and none of the rights that every living being should have.

The policies of the state – of all capitalistic states – as exercised against migrants are part of the more general attack against all those belonging to the oppressed classes. Because even those born here -or who have been in this country for many years – are experiencing an increasingly suffocating reality. They find it difficult to survive in the conditions that bosses and the state are “offering.” They are paid less and less every day for their work, expensive rents drive them away from their neighborhoods, and they are continuously confronted by police whenever they attempt to self-organize in an effort to pursue better living conditions and more freedoms. They feel increasingly that they have no control over their lives.

Recently, the New Democracy government, continuing the work of the previous Syriza government, decided to forcibly close many buildings in the neighborhood of Exarcheia in which mainly migrants lived. Although the buildings were vacant for years and had been serving no one, the state with its cops evicted them, judging that anyone who wanted to organize, fight, and solve his or her housing problem was a threat to “national security” and to the bosses. They transferred the residents to concentration camps and prisons, and expelled their children from schools in the area. In order to prevent people from returning to these homes, they have filled all the streets of the neighborhood with armed policemen trying to intimidate both locals and immigrants still living in the area.

We all face the same obstacles, as workers, unemployed, locals, and migrants from all countries, with or without papers. We want to put an end to the aggressive strategies of the state aimed against us all. We want to organize and act outside of the channels of political parties and vested interests. We want to defend squats and all the places where people meet, find collective solutions to their problems, and fight. We want to put an end to the repression before all the neighborhoods are filled with police and military. Migrants who are locked up in horrible camps such as Moria, Samos, and Amygdaleza are already revolting. In these fights they will find us by their side. The answer to all that is happening must be given by all of us collectively, as only in this way can we halt the fear and take power into our own hands, only in this way can we resist.

TOGETHER WE RISE TOGETHER WE FIGHT

AGAINST THE DEVALUATION OF OUR LIVES

COMMON STRUGGLES WITHOUT NATIONAL DIVISION
AGAINST STATE AND BOSSES

 

Solidarity Demonstration for immigrants and spaces of struggle // Against the State and Capitalistic Development

[November 2] Solidarity Demonstration for immigrants and spaces of struggle // Against the State and Capitalistic Development

On November 2nd, we are calling comrades from Greece and all over the world to show their solidarity, and to unite their voices through calls, demonstrations, and multiform actions.

SOLIDARITY DEMONSTRATION FOR IMMIGRANTS AND SPACES OF STRUGGLE AGAINST STATE AND CAPITALISTIC DEVELOPMENT VICTORIA SQUARE / NOVEMBER 2 / 12:00

The immigrant population is being debased and eliminated on all aspects of its life. In order to flee war and/or poverty they are walking the paths of refugeeism on sea and land, to the squalid conditions of concentration camps, like Moria, where impoverishment and death are usually the only way forward for them. If they survive, there is a war with the cops in the neighbourhoods they live and work. Murders and beatings at the police departments, identifications and arrests that lead to long-term confinements, disappearances and deportations. At work, they get exploited without any limitation as they are the invisible part of the workforce. Their working undervaluation comes along with a total exclusion from educational, health, and other general infrastructures. At the same time, the NGO industry which is active both in and out of the concentration camps, is one of the most lucrative and developing for greek capitalism. There is a constant conflict between greek and turkish states for which of the human-wardens will grab more of the eu warding funds. In these conditions, immigrants resist and revolt. In the cities, they align and get organised with the solidarity movement, and find refugee in its infrastructures. Solidarity infrastructures like squats that used to be a home for hundreds of immigrants, squats that got evacuated and their tenants got transferred to the hellholes of the state. Generally, the spaces of struggle and solidarity not only cover and provide for a huge number of their needs, they also act as places of organisation of the oppressed, and as a substantial trench against the political and financial interests of the state and capital. Places of struggle, whether squats or public spaces, villages and neighbourhoods like Exarcheia, have acted against further degradation of our lives and against a police state. Starting off with the SYRIZA government, and following up with the government of New Democracy, the capitalistic and state machine is going through a reconstruction, promoting ravaging developing plans both for the environment and our neighbourhoods. As a result, the oppressive mechanisms are attacking viciously as they do understand that the marginalised immigrant population in tandem with places of struggle and organisation of the international, oppressed population, are a substantial obstacle for the fulfilment of their plans. Local and foreign business interests are in alignment with the oppressive mechanisms, and that’s why we have to confront them as a whole, starting by defending the people and structures which are under attack.

COLLECTIVE FIGHT WITHOUT NATIONAL DISCRIMINATION AGAINST THE DEGRADATION OF OUR LIVES AND THE DISCPLACEMENT OF OUR BODIES AGAINST STATE AND CAPITAL

On November 2nd, we are calling comrades from Greece and all over the world to show their solidarity, and to unite their voices through calls, demonstrations, and multiform actions.

Open assembly of squats,collectives,internationalists, migrants and solidarians.