Update aus Calais (en)

The Eritrean squat in rue Neuve has been evicted, 70 +? people newly in 
the street. Tents, sleeping bags, blankets are very much needed. Most of 
all we need activists to go to Calais and support!

Following lots of arrivals to Italy via Lampedusa there are now well 
over 100 Eritreans present in Calais. They are escaping a brutal 
dictatorship and a long war with Ethiopia. There are a record number of 
women from Eritrea and Ethiopia in Calais, most are in the safe space 
opened by No Borders. The ?jungles? where Eritreans and Ethiopians wait 
to go to England are full over the limit.? Following the tragedy a 
shipwrecks south of Lampedusa, causing the death of over 350 people, 
mainly Eritreans, there have been protests in Italy and in many European 
cities.

After the Syrians went on hunger strike and occupied the pedestrian 
entrance to the ferry port, the camp of the Syrians in front of the 
place of food distribution was not disturbed by police for a while. 
About 50 people sleep there, including some minors. Today however a 
large number of police went around the place of food distribution. The 
Syrians in this camp are asking for support.

The Afghan jungle is still a main target, police going there every 2 
days approx, usually at 7 am, sometimes they do nothing except asking 
for papers, sometimes they arrest people - even if they have papers. 50 
to 60 people sleep there including some underage boys. 20 to 30 were in 
the small jungle on the other side of the motorway, there may be fewer 
now due to destructions and arrests. Many are deported to Italy or other 
third ?safe? countries.

The Sudanese, Chadians and other Africans still have not been able to 
resettle anywhere, police keep following them closing their squats and 
destroying their shelters.

The month of September has seen:
?? Eviction of the squat in rue Mouron, Beer House where nearly 100 
Africans were living for nearly one year. Twenty Syrians had occupied an 
adjacent cabin and were evicted at the same time. Lots of PAF (Police 
aux frontiers), CRS (riot police) and special police. No arrests.

? Three immediate evictions of the big squats where those people had 
been seeking shelter in the nights following the eviction. This time 
several arrests were made.

? Complete destruction of the Sudanese jungle with around twenty 
arrests. Police and destroyed all the tents they could find, city 
workers taking the blankets and personal things to the to the city dump. 
Everything would have been immediately destroyed if it was not for 
activists and volunteers from the associations going to the dump to take 
them back that day.

? Tents have been destroyed by the police in the Afghan jungle during 
their frequent morning raids usually by PAF and CRS combined. Arrests 
and mass arrests of whoever does not run fast enough. The water point 
where the Afghans used to wash and gather water for drinking and cooking 
has been closed.

?? An illegal eviction of a new squat that would have been able to 
house everyone during the cold winter months based upon falsified 
testimonies.

?? The hotel occupied by the Albanian was also evicted, some occupiers 
arrested. Many Albanians are being deported back to Albania.
?? The Syrians who were sleeping outside the place of food distribution 
were arrested, about 20 people, blankets taken, place boarded up. On the 
same day, some shelters in the small Afghan jungle were destroyed, 
several people arrested, blankets and stuff taken to the city dump.

? ? There have also been a series of attacks by police on the garage 
rented by Calais Migrant Solidarity, who distribute blankets, tents, and 
clothes to migrants. One evening, eight Police Nationale appeared at the 
garage as CMS were distributing clothes and violently pushed those 
out-front away from the garage, smacking people across the face and 
kicking them from behind. This was before taking out their pepper spray 
and spraying everything inside, making the clothes and blankets inside 
impossible to use. However we cleaned up the garage, it was re-opened 
for distribution the very next day, and we have other storage spaces.

Cold and hunger

The local associations who have provided humanitarian aid to the 
migrants for so many years are no longer capable to provide, for lack of 
funding and lack of volunteers. It has even become a problem to find 
enough blankets! Food is down to one meal per day. Migrants are lacking 
everything, and suffering constant hunger.

People desperately need:
?? ? ? ? Blankets
?? ? ? ? Sleeping Bags
?? ? ? ? Tents
?? ? ? ? Warm clothes (sporty not formal)
?? ? ? ? Shoes (sporty such as trainers)
?? ? ? ? Waterproof jackets (not ponchos)
?? ? ? ? Food (not perishable and not expired)
?? ? ? ? Money to buy food and materials

Food is down to one hot meal per day as the associations are not 
receiving enough money and they no longer have enough volunteers. One of 
the associations who give the food, Belle Etoile, decided to dissolve 
because they cannot work in such conditions. The City administration is 
in charge of giving the associations the government money allocated to 
buy food for the migrants. The racist mayor of Calais Natacha Bouchart 
is in position to dictate where and when the associations can distribute 
food.? In 2009,? the association SALAM had two vans and lots of 
volunteers, and they were doing regular distributions of raw food to all 
the jungles and squats in Calais, besides providing a cooked evening 
meal. Now food can only be distributed in that mousetrap that is the new 
place of food distribution, just a ground covered in tar, no tables, no 
chairs surrounded by tall fences that were even topped up with barbed 
wire, before unknown persons cut it off ? Everybody loses between 5 and 
10 kg after arriving in Calais, if not more. Some people have been 
wandering the streets of Europe for years, without finding a country 
that takes them and where they can make a living, always destitute, 
always homeless.

Most migrants present in Calais are refugees from the worst war torn 
countries in the world: Afghanistan, Sudan (especially Darfur, but there 
has been an increase of refugees from South Sudan and other parts of the 
country), Eritrea and Ethiopia, more recently Syria, including Syrian 
Kurdish. Most are already severely traumatized, having lost family 
members and often having risked losing their own lives, escaping forced 
conscription, persecution, arrest, torture?

A safe space
The squat in boulevard Victor Hugo is used as a shelter for women, 
children, families. Currently there are between 20 and 30 women, several 
are pregnant, four children between 3 and 8. Most women are from Eritrea 
and Ethiopia, but also from Somalia, Syria, Egypt. We had three families 
from Syria, with a total of 4 children aged between 7 and 3. It should 
not need saying that a woman or, especially, a child should be 
protected, whether they have papers or not, but if they do not apply for 
asylum in France they leave them in the street.

A bit of background
In 2002 the French government closed the centre of Sangatte, run by the 
Red Cross, where migrants could get a bed, food, showers, medical 
assistance. The reason for that is that the UK government put pressure 
on the French government, while the right wing press were claiming 
Sangatte was a ?magnet? for ?illegal immigrants? trying to reach 
England. Sarkozy was then the Minister for Immigration. People were 
forced to go living in makeshift camps in the woods, or in derelict 
houses, with no electricity, no water, no sanitation. A number of 
associations, mostly run by unpaid volunteers, were formed to feed and 
support the migrants. Police brutality became a common trend, as a mean 
to ?persuade? people to quit the North of France: beatings, use of CS 
gas, destruction of shelters and personal belongings, repeated, 
arbitrary arrests and ID controls? Now police brutality has gone down 
very much, at least in terms of gassings and beatings, thanks to the 
work No Borders have done exposing what they were doing. More needs to 
be done.