Dear all,
"Pointedly one could say that the border regime is being overrun by the persistence of migration movement and that the critical public has emerged as an important factor of support." Thats the main message of the new issue of our "summer Kompass newsletter", in english as textversion attached, and the links to the pdf-versions in english, french and german below.
Best regards,
hagen
English Version:
French Version:
German Version
Kompass – AntiRa – Newsletter No 41 - Juli/August 2015
23. - 28.7. in Frankfurt: Project Shelter and precarious station +++ 2.8. in Barcelona: Invisible Borders Action +++ 15. - 27.8: Back to borders III on Lesvos +++ 21. - 23.8.: Break-Isolation-Days: Nationwide Refugee Conference in Hannover +++ On 6.9. in Tunisia: Freedom Ferry Action +++ Sea Watch - First rescue operations and the situation on the Central Mediterranean +++ Ferries not Frontex campaign +++ Route through Balkan, new fence and protests in Hungary +++ How to continue after the tightening of asylum law +++ further reviews: boat action in Strasbourg, one week permanent Syrian protest in Dortmund, the dead arrive...in Berlin +++ Preview: Social Transnational Strike- Conference from 2. - 4.10. in Poznan
Dear friends!
Exceptionally we don´t publish in the beginning of the month and on our homepage we had announced briefly already: we decided to release a double edition for July and August. Insofar the introduction is longer than usually because it has happened a lot and it is “high season” regards different perspectives.
First of all and enduring at the outer borders of EU.
That there will be more boat people on their way this summer could have been anticipated. Pointedly one could say that the border regime is being overrun by the persistence of migration movement and that the critical public has emerged as an important factor of support. Central Mediterranean as an example: there is a variety of projects in the civil society as eye (keyword Sea Watch) and ear witnesses (keyword Alarmphone) watching, intervening, acting and rescuing – regarding this further down there is some summarizing information and links.
“We have to see the dead. Their final resting-place shall become our political unrest.” These resolute phrases come from the worth seeing mobilization video by the Centre for Political Beauty (see further down) which mid-June in the context of the campaign “The Dead are coming” has called out to a “March of the resolute” to go to chancellery. The question has to be discussed about if and how an enraged remembrance could be possible, if and how such an artist´s action could live up to the situation of the dead´s relatives. That there were more than 5.000 people participating in the protest against the “burocratical murderer in Berlin” was a big sign and the campaign caused at least that the continuous will to let die in the Mediterranean is brought once again into a broader public.
“Ferries not Frontex” keeps on being our main demand against the death-bringing border regime and for legal access to Europe. An according campaign was founded at a meeting in Frankfurt in June (see further down). This campaign has to relate to the entire Mediterranean and thereby also include the Aegean where again and again people capsize on the passage and drown. On the Greek island meanwhile there arrived more people than in Italy, the current situation is an emergency. Who has finally made it to Athens is confronted to closed inner European borders. There are thousands who don´ t have a choice but make their way on the Balkan route through Middle and Northern Europe.
At Greek-Makedonian border as well as at the Serbian-Hungarian border there occurs one drama after another when refugees and migrant encounter brutal border patrol and very soon new fences. At the same time it is remarkably that in lots of places on the route there are built new supporter networks (see reports on Hungary and Greece).
“Dublin is dead actually”
Statistically there is a big gap between the number of requests of transfer e.g. to Hungary or Italy and the number of factual return-removals which is continuously growing. Also here it was and is the persistence of the migrant movement which literally undermined this EU regulation. Refugees and migrants resist on all levels against the forward shifting of the inner European borders. Wherever possible the disposal of finger prints is refused already in the first country of arrival and where there was executed a deportation to Budapest or Rome the persons affected come back and try it again.
Innumerous return-removals are fought against juridically, are made impossible through church asylums or through direct blockades. The attempt to go against this crisis by means of a numerically rather symbolic distribution of a quota on the EU level has failed in the last weeks, too. At the moment Dublin seems to be a hollow Credible Threat of Force only which is desperately maintained by the rulers merely out of a principle and as intimidation but whose disfunctionality is more obvious than never before (according to this topic in detail the recent edition by http://www.hinterland-magazin.de/).
The bitter deafeat tightening of the asylum law
After all in no way we don´t want to draw a rosy overall picture: Dublin is still executed with custody pending deportation in individual cases like currently against the refugee activist in Hannover and maintained as means of threatening. In addition, like feared before, the law concerning the redetermination of the right to stay and terminating of residence was ratified in the German Parliament in the beginning of July (see further down).
This opens up new scopes to deportation authorities to incarcerate especially in Dublin processes. The big achievement of the last years, to have almost beaten custody pending deportation, is now brought up again. This defeat shows us quite plainly the limits of the antiracist movement. Decentralized, variegated and everytime composed newly the resistance against exclusion and deportation has developed very quickly in the last years but this is not sufficient for a well coordinated initiative against a federal law. It remains one of the crucial challenges of the antiracist left.
"Oxi" to the regime of crisis and also of migration...
The second challenge contains the extension with regard to contents and practical “bridges” to other fields of society. For example Greece: It is more than impressive how the “Oxi”, the No of the referendum was carried out by the majority of the Greek general public against the policy of austerity by the institutions. On June 20th there was among other an attempt to organize a big demonstration in Berlin by people from the Blockupy network which should have brought together the solidarity with Greece and refugees. The mobilization remained lowly like currently, after the German dictatory extortion, where there exist calls for protest but they never reach no more than only a small part of the political movement. The problem of mobilization will not be solved by more participation by people of the antiracist movement but even with Greece which is the central current focus according to migrant struggles in Southern Europe these two fields could be easily connected.
Welcome to Europe had prepared a statement before the referendum has passed:
However further practical alliances aren´t built yet. From the international Blockupy network there was created an initiative which we mentioned already in our last newsletter edition and which offers another connective approach.
Under the expression of a social transnational strike they invite for a overall process. In the current call for a conference in October in Poznan (see further down) it says: “A new regime of mobility produces hierarchies between and within European regions and tries to restrict the migrant movements from inner and outer Europe. The global chains of production and care work which go crisscross through Europe use the different wage levels and labour legislation for the purpose of profit...At the moment there are numerous struggles for wages, housing space, access to the social system and freedom of movement in Europe. From different approaches they fight against the current attack on our living and working conditions. Facing the transnational European dimension of this attack it is obvious how necessary the overcoming of their isolation is and how important it is to find common priorities."
With antiracist regards,
the Kompass team
Dates in July and August
From 23rd until 28th of July in Frankfurt: Project Shelter and PrekärStation
A (temporary Shelter for Everyone!- Protestcamp for a solidarity city
More than 1000 people engaged themselves n the 13th of May in Frankfurt in a demonstration with the demand for a self-organized migrantical centre! As anextstep it is announced there will be build up a camp on a central place from zhe 23rd to 28th of July.
More details here:
PrekärStation
Parallel, from 25th to 27th of July, No Troika Rhein-Main in Ostend from Frankfurt creates in the shadow of the European Central Banl another open space for exchange and protest.
Main topics are Gentrification ( Living space struggles as well as the resistance against the exploitation of migrant workers / day worker.
More details:
2nd of August in Barcelona: Invisible Borders Action
Borders kill people. Two sides. One war.
A day of non-violent struggle againts the laws that create borders that
are killing, persecuting and humilliating the impoverished. This laws
are inmoral and criminal.
We want to meet on the beaches, squares, at the doors of the responsible institutions, at the airports, bus and train stations...We invite the entire community to join this struggle that aims to raise our consciousness above unjust laws and shout together: No laws against migrants!
More information:
From 15th until 27th of August: Back to the borders III on Lesvos – situation in Greece
68.000 refugees have been arrived only during the first half of this year in Greece – and so more than via the Central Med in Italy. On the greek islands in the Aegean Sea the few camps are totally overcrowded, many are stuck for days on these islands without support because the registration works only slow. It is missing everything and the supply of the people depends mainly from local solidarity structures which are anyway doing in a very tensed situation an incredible job.
Welcome to Europe and teens without borders are going to travel to Lesvos again from 15th until 27th of August, for most of the involved ones a trip back to the place of their first arrival, in solidarity with the newcomers. During this trip we will report latest from the 14th of August on a blog: http://lesvos.w2eu.net/
An update of the “Welcome to Greece” - Guide from Welcome to Euope is already under progress and can be found already in english:
The crossing still remains very dangerous in little dinghys despite these many arrivals.
On the 7th of July a refugee boat capsized beteween the greek islands Farmakonisi and Agathonisi, apparently 19 people died, on the 17th of Huly 6 people died close to Lesbos.
Despite the clear recession of pushbacks thorugh the greek coast guard after the change of government in January the Alarmphone receives again and again calls from the Aegean Sea, like in the folllowing example from mid-June:
In the mean time thousands of people go on with a trek direction macedonian vorder, over and over we receive calls from desperate people who are facing armed military units. VDÄÄ (Organisation of democratic doctors) published a call for solidarity with the people in Idomeini:
Current reports from Pro Asyl:
From 21st until 23rd of Augut: Break-Isolation-Days: Nationwide Refugee-Conference in Hannover
Since 2012 self-organized refugee protest gained power in Germany. Protestmarches and Protestcamps for example in Würzburg, Berlin, Hamburg and Hannover showed that refugees are able to put their protests on the street.
We want you to invite to Hannover
to get to know each other
to have an exchange about our experiences and possibilities of resistance against discriminate laws for asylum seekers
to talk together about possibilities for fights for a life in freedom and dignity for all in future
Come to Hannover from 21st until 23rd of August 2015.
Contact: refugeecamph@riseup.net
6th of September in Tunesia: Freedom Ferry Action
From the Call:
In the face of migration policies that hamper millions of people in the world to move freely and to seek asylum in Europe without risking to die in the Mediterranean, the Tunisian association formed by the families of the Tunisian missing migrants, La Terre pour Tous, , organizes on the 6th September FERRY FOR FREEDOM, a symbolic "illegal" depart in the Tunisian waters to claim and enact freedom of movement against the deadly effects of the Visa regime, demanding legal and free access to Europe, as claimed by the campaign “Ferry not Frontex”.
The boat will leave from Hammamet the 6th of September and we ask all the people and associations that struggle for freedom of movement and migrant rights to join and support the event.
For more information: Imed Soltani (association La Terre pour tous) : association_laterrepourtout@yahoo.com
Phone contact : 00216 22157103
you find here the link to the crowdfunding page for donations: https://www.lepotcommun.fr/pot/0nvqhh88
(RIB: 02004000000306055497)
Sea Watch and the situation and assessments regarding the central Mediterranean Sea
Sea Watch - first rescue operations
Mid-June the SeaWatch has been arrived in Lampedusa and already during their second mission (beginning of July) they contributed crucially for the rescue of more than hundreds of boatrefugees.
This is an extract from their press statement in which the concrete desription of the emergency situations and rescues is combined with a basic critic concerning the EU-policy:
“We are glad that we were able to rescue more than 250 people this week, but it makes again the desperate situation on the Sea clear. There have to be created legal ways for those people to come to the EU, everything else wont solve the situation. As long as these people are forced on boats it will come to tragedys. Who knows what would have happened if we wouldnt have found these boats!”, says project iniatior Harald Höppner. “It is unacceptable that sea rescue has to be organised by private people while the ships of the army are in the port of Catania and do nothing”, Höppner.
Anyways, the condition of the boats we found shows how dangerous the passage over the Mediterranean Sea is – though searescue! We cant do patrols inside the 24 miles zone of Lybia, what if something happens there? I wonder why these people cant just buy a ticket for the passage, for a safe journey, it is up to the European Union to stop this catastrophal situation here on the Med overnight, that is a political decision! But as long nothing happens here, we will stay on-site and go on rescuing people according to ours lights.”
More information, photos, videos about the rescue missions:
More recent reports and interviews about the Central Mediterranean
The Hotline for Boatpeople, the Watch The Med Alarmphone, publishes regularly reports about operations because of distress in the Mediterranean, look http://watchthemed.net/
Medico International and the Taz published interviews with activists of the Alarmphone in which the situation of the last weeks and days are summarized:
"Frontex is with one's back to the wall"
"If you look away, people die."
Furthermore about the German army recent in the Med:
Refugee rescuer out of order
As well from the new edition of Hinterland:
Dublin – a system in crisis
Ferries not Frontex Campaign
Mid of June activists (most from Rhein Main, but also Bielefeld and Tunis) meet to discuss a campaign with the mentioned slogan. It became clear that a real ferry action in the Central Mediterranean can't be put into practice short-term, but there is interest for a middle-term process concerning this project. As well as they want to write an own appeal and bring the demand with materials and decentralize actions into the public. For this first working groups were made up.
More info and contact via noborderffm@riseup.net
Balkanroute, fence and protests in Hungary
The way of the most people arrive in Greece continue via the countries Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary. The situation in Hungary is similar to Greece: there are insufficient reception capacities and nearly no perspectives for the refugees. So after a very short time the most people travel further into other European countries, often to Austria and Germany – where they are confronted with expulsion to Hungary. De Facto Dublin broke down more or less, which you can see at the number of people send back to Hungary. In the 1st quarter 2015 Germany places 2.952 requests of take to Hungary and solely 42 person have been hand over. The increasing amount of refugees in Hungary leads to substantial tension between the EU and Hungary in the last weeks: The government of Hungary declares towards the other Dublin states that they can't take any Dublin returnees due to “technical problems”. However, the foreign minister of Hungary, Peter Szijjarto, backpedaled one day later because of the pressure of other EU states (especially Austria) and declared that of course they abide by the European agreements.
A recommendable reporting about the refugee situation in Hungary you find at the website of bordermonitoring.eu: http://ungarn.bordermonitoring.eu/
Simultaneously Hungary announced that they will build a fence along the border to Serbia (4m high, 175 km long). The building started at 13 July and the Orban government spread racist agitation. But resistances formed. So a lively citizens initiative was founded in Szeged shortly after the Serbian border. They build up a well organized welcome station at the train station. At 14 July a demonstration took place in Budapest with around 1000 participants. For more info look here: http://www.migszol.com/
At the same time Serbia will became a safe country of origin so deportations will be simplify. Noborder Serbia wants to join the protest and started a solidarity appeal: “We are calling on all no borders activists; all people who believe borders are inherently injust tools for capital to control labour; everyone who believes no human being is illegal, and that all have the right to freedom of movement and settlement; everyone who opposes the securitisation of borders and illegalisation of migrants, to JOIN US at the demonstration, and to form a no borders block, which unites in its rejection not only of the concrete wall in Hungary, but in the rejection of all barriers to freedom of movement and calls for opening all borders.” Look at: https://noborderserbia.wordpress.com/
How it goes on after the tightening of the asylum laws?
As already mentioned in the beginning opens the law new latitudes of imprisment. These are optional provisions which are summarized by Pro Asyl in the next section. These optional provisions have to be scandalized in juristical and political way when they are applied. Numorous acute confrontations around detention pending deportation are expected...
From the Pro Asyl text:
“ … Reasons for arrest within the Dublin procedure will be widen boundlessly
The law allows legal possibility to arrest asylum seekers only because they came from another European country. In accordance with § 2 subparagraph 15 sentence 2 the Dublin arrest will be possible, “when a foreigner left a member state before the ongoing procedure of jurisdiction or the examination of a request for international protection has been finished there...”. This will lead to the possible detention of the majority of asylum seekers which fall below the Dublin III procedure. This violates the Dublin III procedure after which it's not possible to arrest people only because a Dublin procedure is ongoing.
As well worthy of criticism is the reason for arrest in accordance to § 2 subparagraph 14 number 4. After this a foreigner can be detained if he uses a big amount of money to enter the country with the help of a trafficker in terms of § 96 Residence Act. How can human beings seeking protection enter a country wihout so called trafficker if there are nearly no legal ways? Since 1980 Germany implemented systematically the visa requirement for all countries of origin of asylum seekers. This was flanked by more and more sanctioning mechanisms for transport companies. Refugees can't get legal to Germany. A visa is not given. They rely on escape agents to search for shelter in Europe. ...”
More reviews:
10 June in Strasbourg: a boat for the EU parliament
Around 200 activists joined this protest action: refugees brought their demands with a big rubber dinghy to the EU parliament. At the following manifestation in front of the building refugee activists from France and Germany as well as relatives of the disappeared in Tunesia formulated their critique about the EU border regime. The action found a big resonance in the media of Strasbourg.
Reports, pictures, films and interviews concerning the action:
June 2015 in Dortmund: one week Syrian constant demonstration
"Since a week around 100 refugees from Syria protest in a industrial area in the west of Dortmund. Today they set up their camp in the City. Until at least 29 July they want to bring their demands (especially a quick processing of their application for asylum and a faster family reunion) to the public close to the Katharinentreppen (directly in the opposite of the main station)…"
21 June 2015 in Berlin: The deads are coming
From the text to the impressing mobi video:
"... On Sunday a march of the resolute will bring the deads directly in front of the chancellery. Headed by a digger on of the important public spaces of Germany will be converted into a cemetery, on which the victims of the military blockade of Europe will be burried right before the eyes of the political decision-makers.
We have to see the deads. Their last resting place should be our political unrest. ...”
All information to the campaing:
Preview:
Social Transnational Strike- Conference from 2. - 4.10. in Poznan
The complete appeal as well as first information about the program you find here:
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