Today's Topics:
1. Education Workers by the SolFed group in Brighton
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. Britain, AFED, STATEMENT BY FREED ANARCHIST AND LGBT
ACTIVIST IN CUBA FOLLOWING ARBITRARY DETENTIONS
AFTER CANCELLED
STATE-SPONSORED PRIDE MARCH IN HAVANA (ca)
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. Czech, afed.cz: Book festival program (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. Libertarian Initiative of Thessaloniki: Abstention from the
European elections. Conflict with state and local & international
capital Anarchist Federation [machine translation]
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
5. Brighton Solfed: Are you employee at the University of
Brighton? (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
6. Belarus and Soviet authoritarianism By ANA (pt) [machine
translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
7. France, Alternative Libertaire AL #294 - Precariousness: One
solution, the student salary (fr, it, pt)[machine translation]
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
8. France, Alternative Libertaire AL #294 - Tamara (former
Kurdish detainee): " In the prison, there is a great collective
struggle " (fr, it, pt)[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
Working conditions in educational institutions are becoming more and more difficult. This
is often linked to managers making cuts, establishing austerity measures, or asking all
workers to do more for less.We currently organise as a network of workers at University of
Brighton, and have links to other educational institutions. ---- We aim to organise to
improve these conditions on a day-to-day basis, trying to fight winnable disputes for
caretakers, cleaners and hourly-paid lecturers alike. To resist the ways that these
institutions are attacking the working conditions of all staff means working together, not
establishing boundaries between academic and non-academic staff.
Practical modes of organising in the first place might include getting together with
fellow workers to discuss what specific problems there are. Do you have the correct
equipment? Is there a problem with overtime? Has there been extra responsibility added to
your role without recognition of this? Getting together and talking about these things can
help you to work out what a common target might be. For instance, office workers could
consider whether their working environment meets health and safety conditions; hourly paid
and fractional lecturers can insist on collective rather than individual meetings to
discuss teaching allocation, and so on.
The university is trying to exploit its most vulnerable and precarious staff. The first
step in stopping them doing this is small efforts of solidarity. If you're interested in
helping to organise, there are some resources and further information below. We also meet
up once a month to discuss our situations at work and how we can best support one another
with these. If you'd like to start coming along, fill out the contact form below to get in
touch with us.
Office workers
The office environment is often unhealthy and sometimes unsafe, especially if you don't
know what legal rights you have.
This pamphlet, collated by Bristol Soldarity Federation, offers a simple, easy to
understand rundown of your rights, from general laws to specifics around the office
environment.
A handy jargon buster is included along with helpful tips for dealing with common problems
like RSI, eye strain and stress.
And the final section is possibly the most important of all - looking at how we can
organise collectively to make our work permanently safer and healthier.
Struggling? You aren't alone.
Cleaners
Cleaners have a vital role in society, yet their job is poorly paid and routinely
dismissed as a job carried out mainly by women to earn a bit of extra cash. Cleaning is
also not generally seen as a particularly physically hard or dangerous job. Most people
see cleaning as involving a bit of dusting, mopping and hoovering.
Written by a cleaner, this pamphlet draws on research from across the world to show the
reality of cleaning and the impact the job has on the health and wellbeing of cleaners.
The pamphlet not only examines the more obvious aspects of the job that affect cleaners'
health, such as the physical demands of the job and the effects of cleaning chemicals, but
also takes into account the detrimental impact of factors such as low pay, ever-increasing
workloads, low status, sexual harassment and family commitments on the everyday lives of
cleaners. In doing so, the pamphlet exposes the true cost being paid by cleaners and their
families for job that is central to the wellbeing of society as a whole.
As such, this pamphlet is not only essential reading for cleaners but for all those
interested in seeing greater justice for one of the most exploited and marginalised groups
of workers.
The stuff your sexist boss doesn't want you to know
Sexism is a constant presence in many workplaces where it can take many forms. From lower
pay, to expectations of unpaid work, to sexual harassment by bosses, other workers or
customers, sexism means women and workers seen as women are treated unequally on the basis
of sex or gender. Our new pamphlet looks at the reality of sexism in the workplace and
what we can do about it.
As anarcho-syndicalists we favour direct, collective strategies that build and maintain a
culture of resistance in the workplace. While it's not always possible to directly
confront sexism at work, there is still much that can be done to make work more bearable
and undermine sexist behaviour. Coping strategies can allow workers to deal with things on
a personal level while tactics of resistance can help you to actively fight against
unequal treatment, objectification, harassment and structural disadvantage. In this way
workers can organise and fightback, building a culture of solidarity and support at work,
which ultimately means you and others experiencing sexism are less isolated and more
likely to win.
Lecturers
Hourly paid and fractional work is common at Brighton, as is being told your teaching at
the last minute, being given no resources to support you with teaching entire modules,
being underpaid, not being paid over the summer - the list goes on. Whilst the situation
can be difficult, lecturers can take small but significant actions to improve it, such as
accompanying one another to meetings, insisting on collective meetings, sharing
information about administrative processes for claiming and organising with other workers
at the university for better conditions. This document has information that will hopefully
be useful for helping lecturers to navigate hourly paid and fractional work.
http://www.brightonsolfed.org.uk/brighton-education
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Message: 2
Solidarity with our anarchist comrades in Cuba! -- Context:
http://blackrosefed.org/solidarity-with-detained-cuban-anarchist-and-lbgt-activists/ ----
Following tensions around the cancellation of the state sponsored LGBT march and the
effort by activists to call for an independently organized one, two anarchist and LGBT
activists, Isbel Diaz Torres and partner Jimmy Roque Martinez, were detained by Cuban
authorities. The detentions are seen as an attempt by the Cuban state to suppress and
intimidate outspoken activists whom they see as leaders and vocal activists in the LGBT
community in Cuba. ---- Today, Sunday[12th May 2019]at 7am, after almost 24 hours in
police cells in the Aguilera police station, Jimmy and I were freed. The State Security
stopped us to prevent us from reaching the independent march against homophobia that,
nevertheless, happened. We are well, in our Social Center and Libertarian Library ABRA,
and we did not suffer any extra violent abuse to the arbitrary detention. We want to thank
all the people and groups that have shown solidarity. And we want to congratulate all of
us who showed a capacity for self-organization, without the need for great leadership. The
multiple calls, the networks of people and collective allies, the decentralization of the
call and the convergence in the fight against homophobia, transphobia, and religious
fundamentalism, gave good results. Our solidarity comes to those other people who were
also prevented from reaching the march, or who suffered police violence during it.
#LaRevoluciónEsNuestra #LosDerechosNoSePlebiscitan
See also: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-48242255
http://afed.org.uk/statement-by-freed-anarchist-and-lgbt-activist-in-cuba-following-arbitrary-detentions-after-cancelled-state-sponsored-pride-march-in-havana/
------------------------------
Message: 3
The Book of Anarchist Festival is already in the pipeline. We have something to look
forward to. ---- The seventh edition of the Anarchist Festival of the Book will be held on
18 and 19 May 2019 in Prague's Žižkov as we have already informed you when we introduced
the book news of the Anarchist Federation Publishing House . Now the more detailed form of
his program is known (of course, changes are reserved, of course). ---- On Saturday at
10:00, Space 39 will open to the public. You can find it at Rehorova 39, Praha-Žižkov. In
addition to the stalls of anarchist publishing houses, anti-authoritarian groups and
activist groups, a series of lectures, presentations and discussions will be held here
from 4 to 11:
10:15 Zádruha Historical Society - Anarchists in Strike Struggle between 1880 and 1938
11:00 Presentation of the Book by Exarchia Collective New Precarization: Stories of
Everyday Exploitation at University and at Work
12:00 Anarchist Federation Publishing House - Presentation of Book News
12:45 Collectively Against Capital - Social State versus Workers Self-Organization
14:00 We Are Limits - Challenges and Strategies of the Climate Movement
15:30 Arnošt Novák - Outside State and Parties: Autonomous Left Policy
17:00 Pavel Karous - Anti-Fascist Art in the Czech Republic
18:30 Release gig A- songs (music presentation of anarchist songbook )
19:30 Bob Kurík - Microphone is our bomb
20:30 Black Isla Mystic Brothers - Chaos Warriors
In the area of Bike Jesus (Orebitská 5, Prague-Žižkov) you can choose from the following
program:
12:00 María Barba - Constructing Gender through Hair Removal
13:00 Klára Lang - Body as an Anarchist Strategy Space
14:00 Anarchist Black Cross - About
15:00 Miloš Hroch, Viktor Palák - I Cry "It's Me"
16:00 Presentation of a book about Prague group Food not Bombs
17:00 Screening of the document Network + discussion on repression in Russia
18:00 D-Zona - Anarchist discussion: David Graeber on Bullshit Jobs
In the evening, Bike Jesus will be followed by an afterparty with the following music program:
20:30 Dust
21:15 Have You Seen Jenny
22:00 Ctib
23:00 Unicorn Partisans
0:00 DJ Dzony59 (techno)
Although the festival was originally planned to be a one-day event, you may eventually
stay until Sunday and attend one of the following events in Space 39:
13:00 Zine Workshop
15:00 Discussion with Fridays for Future
16:00 Discussion of Solis, Anarcho-Syndicalism and All Others
Annotations on the individual points of the program can be found HERE .
The Salé Infoshop (Orebitská 14, opposite the Bike Jesus) will be open during the festival.
https://www.afed.cz/text/6992/program-knizniho-festivalu
------------------------------
Message: 4
MONEY FROM THE EUROPEANS ---- CONFLICT WITH THE STATE AND DEMOCRACY & INTERNATIONAL
CAPITAL ---- The dominant narrative presents systematically the EU. as a supranational
unification of the peoples with supposedly guiding the safeguarding and promotion of
social vigor. In fact, however, is a transnational body of capitalist integration in the
service of civil interests, in particular financial capital, multinational companies and
monopoly groups. ---- NO SOCIAL LEGITIMATION OF URBAN KIRIARCHY ---- NO CONTRIBUTION WITH
THE EUROPEAN UNION AND THE SYSTEM THAT THEY SERVE ---- The reactionary character of the EU
to the interests of the working class is reflected in the following points:
The international financial management exercised by the EU and its other transnational
partners (see EKT, DTN, OOAA) for fiscal adjustment to repay a debt that has been
abusively called public, while in the reality is a direct consequence of the international
capitalist crisis that arose because of the irreconcilable internal contradictions of the
capitalist system and is sharpened daily by the inability to deal with it. EU Policies
serve the interests of local and international capital through the complete deregulation
of the working environment (flexible, intensified, precarious and mostly uninsured work,
Sunday job for merchants, anti-strike law, dissolution of collective labor agreements,
massive unemployment and casual employment), through the ever-increasing depreciation and
exploitation of the working class (wage and pension cuts, tax cuts, privatizations,
first-time auctions, bank recapitalization through the collapse of public funds reserves,
cuts in public benefits and dissolution of social security), but also the violent
proletariat of other strata. The so-called "exit from the memorandums" is merely a
communication memorandum of SYRIZA in order to pursue the renewal of his government
mandate while continuing to serve the interests of capital. Memoranda, austerity policies
and economic-social impoverishment are not over,
At the same time, we see the escalating rise of the extreme right and the fascists -
funded as always by the great capital and with the tolerance or even support of the
European political elite - resulting in their recruitment to positions of major
opposition, government or co-government in many European states, culminating in the
open-minded action of neo-Nazis in Ukraine, where the EU we have helped openly to the
dominance of the reactionary Euromaidan movement. At the same time, attempts to equate
Nazism with Communism, engaging in a reactionary campaign to revise history, distorting
class memories for the benefit of the bourgeois camp, in order to tear down and suppress
in advance every revolutionary attempt of the working class.
The Europe of the Peoples does not seem to have any difficulty with the thousands of
corpses that its policy has as a result, either directly with military operations in Asian
countries or indirectly with the policy it applies to those who, due to this situation,
are looking for their fortune in the West. The governments of the European states,
apparently serving the interests of capital, open and close the tap of the influx of
immigrants according to the need in the labor force. Facilitating and making it easier for
refugees and migrants to enter European countries, by drowning more or less in the
Mediterranean, is increasing the number of those who manage to reach their coveted
destination, the countries of the "developed" West. By keeping them in a state of
illegality, they manage to always have an alternating army of cheap, consuming workers,
without rights and "invisible" to any arbitrariness and assault. Building concentration
camps, disciplining them, and at the same time sending out a message across our class.
They encourage charity from the bottom when they need it, plant and racist when they are
unnecessary. On the one hand, the EU's bilateral agreement with Turkey dictating the
repatriation of immigrants, while on the other hand Frontex is taking over the work of
military management of migratory flows. Among its tasks is hunting and monitoring, as well
as the training of armed groups to prevent migrants from reaching the borders of Europe.
discipline them and at the same time send a message to our whole class. They encourage
charity from the bottom when they need it, plant and racist when they are unnecessary. On
the one hand, the EU's bilateral agreement with Turkey dictating the repatriation of
immigrants, while on the other hand Frontex is taking over the work of military management
of migratory flows. Among its tasks is hunting and monitoring, as well as the training of
armed groups to prevent migrants from reaching the borders of Europe. discipline them and
at the same time send a message to our whole class. They encourage charity from the bottom
when they need it, plant and racist when they are unnecessary. On the one hand, the EU's
bilateral agreement with Turkey dictating the repatriation of immigrants, while on the
other hand Frontex is taking over the work of military management of migratory flows.
Among its tasks is hunting and monitoring, as well as the training of armed groups to
prevent migrants from reaching the borders of Europe. with Turkey dictating the
repatriation of immigrants, while on the other hand Frontex is taking over the work of
military management of migratory flows. Among its tasks is hunting and monitoring, as well
as the training of armed groups to prevent migrants from reaching the borders of Europe.
with Turkey dictating the repatriation of immigrants, while on the other hand Frontex is
taking over the work of military management of migratory flows. Among its tasks is hunting
and monitoring, as well as the training of armed groups to prevent migrants from reaching
the borders of Europe.
Sharpening imperialist competitions, war preparations and military interventions to open
up new markets, find new business opportunities through the insatiable exploitation of raw
materials and workers' hands in the areas that are in the eye of the cyclone of war,
having as a result of the necessary productive reconstruction of capital.
The plunder of nature for the success of so-called capitalist development. Natural wealth
is universally in the service of capitalist interests, focusing on the capitalist
exploitation of energy and plots (see mining of gold, hydrocarbons, oil) for the
construction of wind farms, hydroelectric plants and dams, and natural gas pipelines (cf.
TAP, East Med) and electricity (see Euro-Asia Interconnector). Capitalist use of energy
resources is accelerated through EU assistance. to conclude corresponding research
programs and construction projects, disregarding the disruption of biodiversity and the
ongoing decomposition of ecosystems caused by the overwhelming need of capital for
self-replication.
TO COLLECT ORGANICALLY THE COLLECTIVE LINES OF THE PASSENGER CLASSIC ARCHIVES
Let us be well aware in our minds that capitalism is not reformed and its barbarity can
not acquire a human face. That is why any aspiring messiah that evokes a humanitarian
rationalization of the conditions of oppression and exploitation of man and nature by man
is from the beginning - the less-useless for the social basis and its real collective
needs. Besides, no one can know better than ourselves and our own collective needs and
desires. That is why we can not accept any external dispatcher of our will. We are
therefore called upon to defend our class interests with our own collective powers, by
participating in everyday social and class struggles, thus abstaining from the elections,
denying and refusing to legitimize and accept the imposition and perpetuation of bourgeois
domination. In order to change the power relations in the ever-raging social and class
conflict, we must give our daily struggles against the barbarity of the state and of
capital by organizing our unwavering resistances, thickening the lines of grassroots labor
unions, neighborhood assemblies, / anti-authoritarian political groups and the structures
of the anti-fascist militant movement.
TO LOOK FOR THE UNIVERSAL HUMAN BEING: FOR THE SEA AND SEXY SOCIETY
The masters try to make us fatal and passive that there is no alternative, that capitalism
is the guaranteed, "realistic" one-way street for the coherent formation of social
formation. But we are looking for a world for all and not for a few. That is why we call
on the oppressed and the exploited to proceed with a common step in a straight and
widespread conflict with the state and the capital, on an international scale, in the
direction of the social revolution. To fight together and from the bottom for everyone's
freedom and equality; for an emancipated society of generalized self-direction and
self-management, structured from the bottom up, without class exploitation, oppression and
relations of separate power and hierarchy,
Anarchist Federation
anarchist-federation.gr
anarchist-federation @ riseup.net
twitter: twitter.com/anarchistfedGr
fb: facebook.com/anarxikiomospondia2015 /
Youtube: Anarchist Federation
https://libertasalonica.wordpress.com/2019/05/19
------------------------------
Message: 5
Are you an administrator, cleaner, estates staff, catering staff, librarian, support
staff, or lecturer at the University of Brighton? Fed up of short-term contracts, poor
pay, poor working conditions, bullying by managers, and being overworked? Fed up of being
told that cuts are needed while 14 managers enjoy their six-figure salaries? ---- Brighton
Solidarity Federation is a union for all workers. Our members at the university support
one another to deal with these problems and organise for better conditions. To find out
more or come along to one of our meetings, email brighton@solfed.org.uk, or text
07790607310 ---- We also welcome all students frustrated with the direction taken by the
University of Brighton. ---- You can also find more information, including on your rights
as a cleaner, office worker, lecturer, and on sexism in the workplace, here:
http://www.brightonsolfed.org.uk/brighton-education
------------------------------
Message: 6
Yavor Tarinski interviews the anarchist and ex-prisoner Ihar Alinevich ---- Ihar Alinevich
is an anarchist from Belarus (a country still living in the Soviet era) who paid dearly
for his ideas, going through the hell of the Belarusian criminal system. We had the rare
opportunity to meet him and interview the Greek anti-authoritarian magazine Babylon about
the situation in his country and the libertarian movement there. What is being described
below takes place in real life and in the 21st century in a country that is now being
considered a "civilized European state". ---- Ihar Alinevich is one of the victims of the
2010 repression wave in Belarus against the anti-authoritarians. As an anarchist and
active participant in demonstrations, Ihar had to leave the country to avoid persecution,
fleeing to Moscow. On 28 November 2010, however, he was abducted by Belarusian KGB agents
and taken back to Belarus, where he was tried for a farce and found guilty of arson
attacks against Belarusbank and the "Shangri La" casino, as well as for throwing a flag at
the General Headquarters of the Belarusian military during an anti-militarist
demonstration in Minsk. He was sentenced to 8 years in a colony of corrective work with
enhanced regime. Demonstrations in solidarity with him and other Belarusian political
prisoners were organized in cities around the world.
After his release, Ihar was forced by the authorities to leave Belarus permanently. He
wrote a book called "On the Road to Magadan: Prisoner's Diary" (2014), in which he
describes the regime of Belarus, his tortured experience in prison, and elaborates his
libertarian ideas.
Some notes on the current political reality of Belarus
After the independence of Belarus from the Soviet Union in 1991, the Social Democrat
Stanislav Shushkevich became head of state until 1994 when he lost the communist Alexander
Lukashenko. Lukashenko remains in power until today - winning, consequently, 5
presidential elections, with about 80% of the votes each time. Belonging to the communist
regime's framework of trust, he was a director of a kolkhoz, served on the Soviet border
troops and was an assistant political officer in the Soviet army. Lukashenko was the only
Member to vote against the independence of Belarus from the Soviet Union in 1991. The
Communist Party of Belarus is fully supporting Lukashenko's presidency.
Today, Belarus continues to function in a Soviet way: in a strongly authoritarian way.
Most of the economy is still under state control. It is the only country where the KGB
continues to function after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. On a symbolic level, the
national coat of arms maintains its Soviet aesthetics with ears of wheat and a red star
with only the hammer and sickle, which used to be in the middle of the symbol, to be
replaced by a red map of Belarus. It is also the last country officially celebrating
October Revolution Day: The only other country where this holiday was observed until the
last years was Kyrgyzstan, where since 2017 was replaced by the "Days of History and
Ancestral Memory."
Modern Belarus was labeled as the "last dictatorship of Europe". As Ihar writes in his
book: "There is no possibility of public policy expression. Absolutely all peaceful
political initiatives in Belarus are harshly repressed: it is impossible to hold a legal
picket or demonstration, an open discussion or meeting - people are arrested even in punk
concerts. " Tens of thousands of people are held in prisons and labor camps. But its
extreme authoritarian system does not prevent the US and EU countries from doing business
with it.
The geographical position of Belarus makes it an important location for transporting huge
quantities of natural gas, oil and other raw materials from Russia to Western Europe. In
2016, the EU came to suspend most of the sanctions imposed on the regime, due to the
growing economic interests of Brussels in the country, which led to intense protests of
human rights organization.
The interview with Ihar Alinevich
How long did you stay in jail and when did they let you go? How was the experience of a
21st century communist prison?
Ihar Alinevich: I spent almost 5 years in prison. During that time, I moved to two prisons
and two penal colonies. The arrest and detention at the KGB detention center are described
in the book "Going to Magadan". Conditions were constantly worsening, not only for
political prisoners, but generally for all prisoners. I spent 126 days in the punishment
cells and 80 of them - during the last year of detention, when the authority sent me to a
special "red colony", which was supervised by the KGB.
Despite the fact that the number of prisoners in Belarus is one of the highest, people
know very little about prisons, although mass culture is deeply infiltrated with jargon
and prison concepts. Apparently, this is a psychological defensive reaction of the people
who have gone through the mass repression of communism.
What I saw was a shock to me. I expected something quite different: the usual rude and
violent attitude of the guards, as well as the threats of criminals, as in the movies. In
fact, the main threat was the scientific system of suppression of the masses introduced by
the Communists and brought to perfection in 90 years.
Modern prisons differ from GULAG by 4 characteristics: there are no more starvation deaths
(but there is a half-deprived existence), the temperature in the barracks has been
improved (but you still need to sleep in clothes and cover yourself with a padded jacket),
there is no exhaustive work (but the prisoner is still brought to industrial areas to work
and receives no money) and the practice of killing prisoners for no real reason has been
closed (although exceptions are sometimes possible).
However, basically, this is a real concentration camp, intended to destroy a person
morally, spiritually and making it unfit for society. Therefore, most of the released
(56%) return to camp again and again.
A few days before my release I was accused of criminal violations of the arrest warrant.
That meant up to 2 years beyond my time in jail. For some prisoners, including
politicians, such a measure was indeed enforced. But during the years I spent in there, I
got used to the idea of going to prison as much as the authorities decide. I was
repeatedly offered to sign a petition for clemency and release, but of course such an act
would be absolutely unacceptable to the anarchist entity and to personal dignity.
However, before the presidential elections in 2015, Lukashenko released 6 political
prisoners in an attempt to show a more human face. The KGB put me on an outside watch and
demanded that I leave the country, otherwise they would accuse me of preparing a terrorist
attack on the president. I decided not to check the credibility of their threat and I left
Belarus. The police were still at my parents' house for formal verification.
Tell us a few words about authoritarianism and vigilance in modern Belarus. Does KGB still
exist?
IA: The KGB could not be absent because the Belarussian system is the best preserved
fragment of the Soviet Union. More than Russia and Ukraine. The same people who were in
power before the collapse of the USSR remained in command of the country. Bureaucrats and
"red directors" only changed the flag and picture of the governor on the walls of their
offices. Almost everything is concentrated in the hands of the ruling elite. Political
competitors were killed in the 1990s. Instead of many oligarchs, we have a super oligarch.
Besides Lukashenko, there are no other politicians, no debates, no one dares to contradict
him. Even the liberal opposition is reduced to decoration, so that the regime can speak
behind a democratic facade. Any minister or general can easily get behind bars. This
clearly resembles Stalin's style of administration. Ideology - the patriotism of World War
II, while the huge statue of Lenin sits right in the central square of Minsk.
What made you and your companions become anti-authoritarian? What was the influence of the
December 2008 uprisings in Greece among the Belarusian radicals?
IA: The basis of my generation of anarchists was the punk subculture. It was a nihilistic
protest against society and anarchism was perceived as a continuation. Along with this, we
were formed at the time of the rise of the national liberation movement, when the streets
were agitated by demonstrations with tens of thousands of people and clashes with the
police. Many anarchists in their 13-16 years have appeared in this environment, including me.
In 2000, two wings were assigned to the Belarusian libertarian movement. The first, let's
call it "Eurolie", wanted to repeat the Western experience: subculture, occupations,
antifa, ecology, feminism, LGBT, gender. The other, "social revolutionary," was based more
on classical anarchism. After all, we could get the old books of Bakunin and Kropotkin and
learn about the history of the revolutionary movement in Tsarist times. Moreover, since
the 1980s, various anarchist theorists have remained in Russia; they published articles
and books on the Spanish Civil War, the Russian Revolutions, the International, etc. It
was our source of examples. At the same time, there were almost no books on postwar
anarchism, we did not experience the years 60-80. All we knew were some simple articles
about the German autonomous scene and alterglobalism. It was very ... different from
Makhnovshchina.
Many of us wanted to break with the subcultural ghetto, we wanted a mass labor movement.
Now I can not even believe it, but I consider myself an orthodox anarcho-syndicalist who
honored the CNT as an ideal. At that time, I did not know that anarchists are also
creating their own mythology. In any case, the workers were passive, there were no unions
or moderates, a complete nothingness. There was a political silence, and that silence was
unbearable.
Events in Greece in 2008 have become the star-guide. It was a signal to many, many groups
located on the vast space of the former USSR. We hope to break the wall of indifference
and apply ourselves in a real attempt.
Why are anarchists considered by the Belarusian regime as the main enemy? What other
groups are being suppressed?
IA: The irony is that anarchists pose no real threat. The police are very well versed in
the movement, suppressing instantaneously all new approaches and carrying out punitive
repressions. The question is different: the anarchists were appointed by the government to
the role of scapegoats.
Authoritarianism can not exist without the image of the enemy. Previously, government
propaganda was based on anti-Western rhetoric, the main enemy was the opposition as a
"fifth column." Today, the opposition has a miserable existence, it is difficult to be
presented as a real threat. Moreover, after the beginning of the conflicts with the
Kremlin, the regime flirts with the West. Therefore, the authority has changed the image
of the enemy from external to internal.
Not only anarchists were declared enemies, but soccer hooligans and fascists as well. Now
the representatives of these movements in prison have to wear special yellow badges, which
means "prone to extremism." The government was frightened by the Ukrainian Maidan, so it
was determined to neutralize all the informal movements of youth. The anarchists simply
received the role of the man in front.
However, the main social group facing real mass repression are addicts. In 2015, the media
incited anti-drug hysteria and Lukashenko demanded the creation of special prison camps
for addicts and "a regime that forces them to seek the death penalty." I personally saw
these changes in the penal colonies when all the addicts were transferred to an
overcrowded tent.
How many are political prisoners in Belarus today? Are there separate prisons for
political and non-political prisoners?
IA: The authority does not recognize the existence of political prisoners, so they are
holding them along with other prisoners. But the pressure on prison administration from
above is a clear indicator of who you are. The conditions for political prisoners are
always worse than for ordinary prisoners (except for anti-regime detainees) and generally
worsen over time. For example, the administration may prohibit prisoners from talking to a
political prisoner. Or constantly throwing the political prisoner into solitary for no
real reason. Such an approach is even more evident than public opinion, because society
incessantly questions who to consider as a political prisoner, and who does not.
The issue of political prisoners in Belarus is very similar to the situation during GULAG.
Of the many millions of people convicted under political articles, only a very small
number had relations with political groups. People were simply assigned to the role of
political actors to justify the existence of mass repression. The goal was to create an
overburdened atmosphere to eliminate competitors in the struggle for power as well as
create a huge army of workers for industrialization.
Now there is no need for industrialization, but retention of power is still relevant.
Moreover, such a large number of prisoners is a profitable business. Belarus occupies a
leading position in the world in the number of police officers. What will they do without
a huge mass of condemned people annually?
Tell us a few words about the Belarusian libertarian movement: what are its roots, when
the first Belarussian anarchists appeared and existed during the Soviet era?
IA: The roots of the anarchist movement date back to the days of the tsarist empire. In
general, the revolutionary movement was much stronger around the periphery: Latvia,
Poland, Belarus, Ukraine and the Caucasus. In the first Russian Revolution of 1905,
anarchists in Belarus became a very formidable force. The movement was originally of an
international nature: many Jews lived in Belarusian cities (often more than half the
population) as well as Poles. The main impulse was given by the Federation "Bread and
Will", formed in Switzerland and connected with Kropotkin.
In the course of the radicalization, the "Black Flag" Federation appeared, whose strategy
combined labor struggle, expropriation and terror. Due to the fact that the terror was
directed mainly to the representatives of the government and the bourgeoisie, the "Black
Flag" quickly gained much support from the workers. The youth of the socialist parties
(Jews, Poles and Belorussians) began to join massively to the anarchists. Authorities
reacted with immediate executions because anarchists often escaped from prisons or
attacked trains. The average age of the anarchists was 16 years, about 70% died or were
arrested.
Those who survived hard work and emigration later returned and played a significant role
in the Revolution of 1917. In general, Belarusian anarchism was distinguished by its
international character and radicalism.
After the revolution, Belarus was divided between the USSR and Poland. The NKVD quickly
neutralized the anarchists because the Bolsheviks knew them well by the underground armed
resistance during the German occupation of the First World War. The rebirth of the
absolute zero movement began only in the 1980s.
There is a lot of controversy over the "social parasitism" tax in Belarus, which obliges
the unemployed to pay for being "useless" to society. What happened to this law?
IA: The real reason for introducing the tax is that a large number of Belarussians (0.5 to
1 million) work overseas and do not pay taxes. It seems to me that the government itself
did not expect such a reaction, it did not expect it to truly reach the unemployed. For
the first time in 20 years, the country has seen a truly social protest. And at first, the
authorities did not know what to do with it, because using the police would mean utter
destruction of the image of "people's government." Before, the police were used to crush
the opposition or the students, but never the ordinary workers.
Now the authorities are applying a new approach: a person working abroad receives a
notification that he is a "parasite" and, to prove otherwise, you must provide your
personal data, in particular, a work contract. I would call this a new instrument of
totalitarianism: a method of controlling citizens not only within the country, but also
outside it.
Source: https://www.babylonia.gr/2019/02/04/leukorwsia-kai-sovietikos-apolytarxismos/
Translation> Remembrance of the Oppressed!
Related Items:
https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2015/08/25/bielorrussia-ihar-alinevich-mikalai-dziadok-e-artsiom-prakapenko-sao-libertados/
https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2017/10/13/invasoes-e-events-with-the-police-repression-to-bielorrussia/
https://noticiasanarquistas.noblogs.org/post/2017/03/26/repressao-na-bielorrussia/
anarchist-ana news agency
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Message: 7
In view of the constantly declining social situation of students in Europe and around the
world, some student unions are defending financial mechanisms that allow students to
follow their training rather than work hard to survive. ---- Since its announcement in
November 2018, the increase in registration fees at the University of France, for students
who do not come from the European Union, has sparked strong debates, both on television
and television. in the general assemblies within the different facs. ---- These exchanges
were only a repetition of an old antagonism between two conceptions of higher education.
The first, the one that sees them as an investment, justifies the idea that you have to
buy "skills" to get a better salary when you actually get to work. It is therefore normal
that tuition fees are high and that the student goes into debt to finance his studies.
The second conception considers higher education as a right. This is to ensure that every
person has the opportunity to go to the University if they wish, and then to ensure that
they can study in the best possible conditions. It follows logically from the demands like
the free studies or the setting up of financial mechanisms allowing the students to
concentrate on their formation without having to work in parallel. The student salary,
which is defended in France by Solidaires étudiant.es, is the most radical form of this
kind of mechanism.
This claim aims to provide a salary to each student, taking effect from the end of
compulsory schooling, and allowing them to continue their training in complete autonomy,
without parental, state or private guardianship. Since training is not a passive
investment in the future, but a positive contribution to social production, it is a
question of paying it.
Listening to initiatives
If Solidaires étudiant.es is the spearhead in France, it is in the framework of the
discussions started recently, that the three major student unions of the European Network
of Alternative and Basic Trade Unions - Resab [1]made a joint call [2], inviting all
organizations and collectives interested in this claim to discuss it, in the framework of
a European assembly.
A response, unifying all workers in training on a combative basis, is becoming more and
more necessary. Not only to protect acquired rights, but to conquer others, and to break
the logics of precariousness and social reproduction that reign in training.
This international appeal is an encouraging sign for all those who consider that student
unionism should not confine its action to daily struggles, but that it must also set
itself ambitious goals of social transformation. Whatever our opinion on this idea of
student salary, we must therefore listen to any initiative of this type.
Guillaume (AL Paris Nord-Est) and Gabriel (SOUTH EP)
[1] Student solidarity in France, the Union Syndicale étudiante in Belgium and SUD Student
and precarious in Switzerland (SOUTH EP).
[2] Salary-student.org
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Precarite-Une-solution-le-salaire-etudiant
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Message: 8
In Kurdish prisons, the struggle of political prisoners continues, with several hunger
strikes already deadly. But if detention is a test, it is also a moment of solidarity and
formation. Tamara, a 20-year-old Kurdish classmate, spent more than a year in the
Diyarbakir Women's Prison (Amed) before being released. Last year, she told the prison
daily and collective organization in a brochure produced by the collective Ne Var Ne Yok.
---- Can you tell us first when did you go back to prison, how long did you stay, and what
were you accused of ? ---- Tamara : I came back in the fall of 2015 after four days in
police custody where the cops violently beat me. And then I went to court. I was accused
of being part of the YDG-H organization. I stayed one year and three months in prison. I
went out after the second judgment. At the third hearing, the court declared that I was
not guilty, they did not find anything about me. I was taken one year and three months of
my life "only".
So, did you end up in Diyarbakir Women's Prison ?
Tamara : Yes, I was in a type E prison, where militant women are imprisoned. We were 35
people. Nobody can do what he wants in it. All those locked up are for political reasons.
The atmosphere is nice between us, everyone listens, we all try to continue life as we
can. If there is a problem, we stop, we discuss and explain, without ever fighting. There
are different tasks on a daily basis, and we do everything in common. Each one is
responsible for the collective, and for what must be done.
The guards and the military do not look at us at all the same way as the other detainees.
They are harder and stricter with us. But inside, there really is a great collective
fight. In relation to the enemy, your behavior is very clear. There is no step back. We
know what to do.
For example, if there is a problem with the matons, if they shout at us or insult us. It
happens rarely, but if it happens, we start fighting directly against it. We are locked
inside, we are being searched, repressed, but they know that if they start to create more
problems, we will not let it go. And they have that fear.
A typical day, how's it going ?
Tamara : We get up together at 7:30 ; it is we who decide to get up at this hour. The
reason is that when they come to count us, they do not see us in their pajamas or awake
awake. It's our discipline, it's our rule: they can not see us in a situation of
"weakness". When they come to count us, we have already had our breakfast, the beds are
made ...
Other than that, we use our incarceration time a lot to learn and politicize more, or to
change our consciousness. One gives oneself hours to read books, and then one discusses
with the friends around the books that one or the others have read. We just take breaks to
eat, but we quickly return to our readings during times of collective silence. There are
also times a little more formal, where we divide some books to do after presentations in
front of all others. Each one has a kind of responsibility in the tasks of the day.
Finally, in the evening, from 7 pm to 10 pm, it is often another reading beach, where one
puts more emphasis on how one tries to change oneself. Or we watch movies about the
history of struggles. There are some friends who know these films and who introduce them
to us. Those who want to watch them do it, downstairs, in the room provided, and the
others remain to read in the cell ...
The walkout is free ? You can circulate in which spaces ?
Tamara : We have a space of two floors. Downstairs, there is the refectory, and it is not
we who prepare meals, except kahvalti, breakfasts. And up there, there are spaces to sleep
and read. For the walk, one can go there freely. The courtyard is open at 6 am and closes
at 4 pm in winter and at 7 pm in summer. But we stay pretty inside.
Was there a building for men ? And a separation with prisoners of " common law " ?
Tamara : For example, where I was, it was in an E type woman building. The men are in
another building. Those who are there for stories of drugs or crimes, those who are not
"political" are on one side, and militant men are on the other. As for women. And, among
the politicians, they sort out, and do not put jihadists and revolutionaries together.
We almost never meet fellow men locked in the other building, it is very rare. After the
purges of July 15, 2016, the state also locked Gülenists accused of the coup attempt, but
they were not seen either. It's very compartmentalized.
Fresco of the artist Banksy made in New York on March 16, 2018 in support of Zehra Dogan ,
a Kurdish feminist sentenced in 2017 to two years in prison for a cartoon denouncing the
destruction of the city of Nusaybin in 2016. Zehra left prison on February 24, 2019.
As for the struggles inside, what forms does it take ? Are there any escapes ?
Tamara : There, right now, there are hunger strikes for a number of claims, including
detention conditions. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not work, and sometimes it
dies. It is to be heard. There are also actions where slogans are slogans for a while in
the prison.
But the demonstrations of support organized outside, it is more often for the prisoners
condemned for crime ... And escapes, it is very rare. The last one was in type D, where
six comrades managed to escape. It was last year. It was great, they were not picked up,
and after that, they sent hello from Qandil [1].
Now that you're out of prison, how are you going to continue fighting ?
Tamara : It was really another period, the prison. Now that I'm out, and I've started my
life, it's a bit weird. Bizarre to find myself with friends with whom I can speak
normally. It's so different when you're inside.
Once you are outside, you have the impression that you do not see this light, this
collective force, so intensely, every minute. It makes you like a little injury. But for
me, I feel like I'm fighting all the time. It's not just a period. It's not something an
hour, a week. At the moment, it's hard to project. Politics in Turkey, every month it
changes. But the fight is all the time.
Complete interview to find on Ne Var Ne Yok's blog
[1] The PKK holds a vast maquis in the Qandil Mountains, in Kurdistan of Iraq.
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Tamara-ex-detenue-kurde-A-l-interieur-il-y-a-une-super-lutte-collective
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