October 2015

Ireland to Calais Refugee solidarity - Report as the 1st convoys departed

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One of our member is now at the refugee camp in Calais as part of the solidarity convoy that arrived from Ireland a couple of days back.  Before he left he filed this report for us.

Today the first of Ireland-Calais Refugee Solidarity’s convoys of basic aid is due to arrive in the French port of Calais. The aid is for distribution among the several thousand refugees living in deplorable conditions in makeshift camps outside the town, hoping to gain entry into the UK.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been lucky enough to be part of the ‘Ireland Calais Refugee Solidarity’ group, collecting and organising for refugee aid convoys, the first of which is being delivered to Calais today. The group was initially set up by one very impressive person from Cork, Tracey Ryan, who was planning on collecting donations and delivering them to Calais personally. Apparently though, interest in the solidarity action was so large that it grew into a cross-country action, focused in Cork and Dublin.

Make McNamara’s Class Pay! Against all Landlords! Squat the City!

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Bernard McNamara and his class are thieves who well deserve our scorn and derision. But if our communities want to take control of our city we must organise together. 
 
News broke last week of how residents in a Dublin apartment complex are facing a €4 million bill to fireproof their homes. Or else they face eviction. Around 900 people live in 300 apartments in the Longboat Quay complex in Dublin's docklands, 'built' by developer Bernard McNamara in 2006. People paid between €450,000 and €750,000 for apartments there at the height of the boom. Longboat Quay also incorporated some social housing units. 
 

The Firehouse Squat on Gardiner place prior to eviction - video report

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About 10 days ago three van loads of riot cops arrived at the door to No 2 Gardiner Place at around 9am,  There they formed a Roman style tortoise shell shield formation and proceeded to start to batter the door down.  Once in they stormed through the building, arresting the residents and dragged them down to the High Court for an eviction / injunction hearing at which they were forced to agree not to try and re-enter the house.  No media outlet deemed any of this worthy of coverage.

Solidarity Times had been in the building the previous week, shooting some video in anticipation of a campaign in opposition to the eviction.  We’re assembled a video report on the space from that footage as yet another example of the vast amount of empty housing that is around even inner city Dublin. Homelessness is not caused by a lack of usable buildings but by deliberately leaving such buildings empty and boarded up in order to create the scarcity that is seeing rent hikes and a new property bubble.

At the unofficial border crossing between Serbia and Croatia

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A few kilometres away from the small Serbian border town of Sid, a dirt track through corn and turnip fields serves as passage to tens of thousands of women, men and children seeking refuge and lives of more possibility.

The unofficial border crossing between Serbia and Croatia is surrounded by sun-lit verdant fields, apple orchards in the distance and a calm that brings temporary respite to those who have been on the road for weeks or months. The threat of militarised borders and recent memory of dehumanising conditions along the way is temporarily kept at bay as those walking stop to drink freshly pressed apple cider handed out by a local farmer, chat and rest before they continue on.

8th Belfast Anarchist Bookfair - Sat 10th October 2015

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poster for 8th Belfast Anarchist Bookfair 2015

 

The 8th Belfast Anarchist Bookfair takes place Saturday and WSM will be there. Call by our stall for a chat during the day.

BABF is at a new venue this year, Oh Yeah Music Centre, 15-21 Gordon Street, from Midday

Stalls by Solidarity Federation, Alliance for Choice, Abortion Rights Campaign, AK Press, Art n Anarchy, Anarchist Federation, Anti-Racism Network Ireland, Bundschuh Conspiracy (T-shirts), Die Rex, IWW, Just Books, Sex Workers Alliance Ireland, Workers Solidarity Movement, Queer Action, Rebel County Books.

The Barricade Inn - interview and video tour

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An interview with a couple of the people involved in The Barricade Inn, the squatted social centre on Parnell street, including a video tour of the interior.

Anarchists in Turkish state on Ankara bombing of peace rally

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Shorting after yesterday's bombing of a pro-Kurdish peace rally in Ankara, the capitol city of the Turkish state out friends in DAF released the statement below.  Since the release the death toll from the bombing has gone over 100 people and is expected to rise further.


CAN’T BE FORGOTTEN, CAN’T BE FORGIVEN

Mass murder in Ankara - the finger points at the Turkish state

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Graffiti  at the site of the bomb explosion in Ankara that reads "It was not terror that killed us, it was the state" Graffiti has appeared at the site of the bomb explosion in Ankara yesterday that reads "It was not terror that killed us, it was the state." This is reflecting the widespread belief that the true origins of the bombing that killed around 100 people at the pro Kurdish peace demonstration are to be found in Erdogan's AKP party desperate attempt to intensify conflict in the hope of polarizing the electorate ahead of Novembers elections. The same process in other words that those killed yesterday were demonstrating against.

Drive by police pepper spray attack on migrant women at Calais

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Last week some of the Ireland to Calais refugee solidarity convoy were on the road in the vicinity of the Calais migrant camp when they witnessed and recorded a pepper spray drive by attack by the French police on a group of women standing by the road side.

10 deaths in fire on halting site for Travellers in South Dublin - more victims of housing crisis

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Yesterday saw the tragic deaths of ten people that were killed in a fire that engulfed their home in a halting site for travellers in South Dublin. The people killed in the fire includes five children under the age of ten, and one of the children was six months old. The fire brigade was called at around 4am. The fire brigade took two adults and two children from the scene who are being treated in hospital. It is believed there were two families living in the halting site.

Travellers’ struggles are our struggles too: decent housing for all!

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Last weekend, ten people died in a fire at a halting site in South Dublin. Thomas Connors, Sylvia Connors, Willie Lynch, Tara Gilbert, and Jimmy Lynch and five children lost lives. Their deaths are a tragedy, and we mourn their loss. But we are also angry. Because we know the loss of their lives was not the outcome of chance or blind fate. Our society, its laws and its institutions are designed to marginalise, to penalise and to discriminate against Travellers. So long as we accept these forms of oppression and exploitation, tragedy will follow tragedy.
 

Turkey, Ankara: Report of Funeral of Anarcho-syndicalist Ali Kitapci

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Funeral of  Ali Kitapc first person to organise for the anarcho-syndicalist cause in modern Turkey. He was one of the 14 members of Independent Transportation Union killed in the Ankara bombing on Saturday.

We remember Ali Kitapci, the first person to organise for the anarcho-syndicalist cause in modern Turkey. He was one of the 14 members of Independent Transportation Union killed in the Ankara bombing on Saturday. He first get involved with the anarchist movement in England and continued to be active for the last 30 years. Apart from his fight for syndicalism, he was an active member of many anarchist organisations in Ankara from the second half of 1980s.

There will be a protest at the Turkish embassy in Dublin this Thursday at 18.30.  The embassy is on Raglan Road.  FB Event

We know those responsible for the Ankara bombing - statements of Kara Kizil ( Istanbul ) and Tacanka ( Ankara )

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They painted our red and black flags and banners with blood and flesh of our comrades. Those responsible for the massacre are out there. We know them from Haymarket, Bloody Sunday, Mayday 1977 Istanbul Massacre, Reyhanli, Gezi Uprising, Roboski Massacre, Diyarbakir Dungeons and Suruç. We know them from the daily exploitation of a thousand year. They stand before us merciless, smirking.

Solidarity from Ireland to Calais migrant camp

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The first solidarity convoy from Ireland to Calais returned a few days ago and Mairead Mary Frances Healy posted a great report on what was done (below) that has now been turned into this graphic. We applaud this solidarity with those who have spent the summer fighting the racist border policy of Fortress Europe through the direct action of breaking down the fences.

Believe a better world is possible and don't be afraid to dream

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Believe a better world is possible. Don't be afraid to dream. We all know this isn't good enough. How could it be? Are we not destined for so much more? Have we not seen glimpses of what we are truly capable of? This could be paradise. It really could be.

Margaret Thatcher, former UK prime minister, was fond of bragging that 'There Is No Alternative!'. Settle in you plebs, there is no way out, this is it. Capitalism is the only way - and not only capitalism, but capitalism in its most feral neoliberal form.

And not only that but state domination, and the assault on our persons by an arsenal of tyrannies: sexism, racism, queerphobia, ableism, and more.

Stephen Hawking - choice is between life of shared luxurious leisure and greedy miserable poverty

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"If machines produce everything we need, the outcome will depend on how things are distributed. Everyone can enjoy a life of luxurious leisure if the machine-produced wealth is shared, or most people can end up miserably poor if the machine-owners successfully lobby against wealth redistribution. So far, the trend seems to be toward the second option, with technology driving ever-increasing inequality"

Solidarity with Jamaica to UK's “keep your prison, give us schools, give us infrastructure, not prisons”.

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In case you missed it, David Cameron does not believe that reparations or even apologies are the right approach when dealing with the legacy of the enslavement of the Jamaican people at the hands of British Imperialism.

Renua exposed as yet another party for the super wealthy

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It's not really a secret to anyone paying attention but Renua have really blown their cover with their pre-budget submission. Far from being any sort or radical departure they are yet another party for the wealthiest 1% who have been plundering our labour with the aid of every previous government.

As Michael Taft explains "Renua has called for a flat-rate tax. It represents a massive transfer from the lowest income groups to the highest income groups. It will require low and middle income groups to fund not only their own tax cuts but even higher tax cuts for those on much higher incomes.
... they want to cut inheritance tax to 20 percent while raising thresholds to €500,000. Someone inheriting €1 million would gain over €150,000."

Dublin protests in solidarity with those targeted by Ankara bombing in Turkey

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People gathered outside the Turkish embassy in Dublin last night to take part in a solidarity protest of remembrance for the 100 plus people killed in the bombing of a peace rally in Ankara on Saturday. 

Free Republican Prisoner Willy Wong

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A case that needs highlighting is the case of Republican prisoner Willy Wong - he is held in Maghaberry Prison in Co Antrim. In March 2010 he was arrested along with another man and charged, eventually convicted of possession of a pipe bomb. He was sentenced very differently to the way Republican prisoners (and social prisoners) usually get sentenced. He was sentenced for an undetermined period, but after 5 years inprisoned it would be up to the Parole Board to decide when he is to be released.

Willy Wong was 22 when arrested, he is now 27 years old, he is still in jail. In March he was up in front of the Parole Board. The board came to the conclusion that Willy Wong is not “eligible” for release. The board said they believe he was not “totally reformed” or had not “fully regretted his actions”.