Struggles in workers' homes ---- Essentially located in the Paris
region, immigrant workers' homes remain hotbeds of struggle, especiallysince the former SONACOTRA homes have become "social residences" managed
mainly by the social landlord ADOMA. On April 19, a rally of 500 people
took place in front of ADOMA headquarters to demand improvements in
living conditions and relations - still tense - with this manager. A
delegation was received to discuss the five main points which
crystallize the anger: the absence of dialogue, particularly with the
delegates of the residents' committees who are elected by the residents;
the expulsion of residents who accommodate a relative in their room,
although this is a common practice, particularly when the worker returns
to their country, but which is now prohibited; lack of respect for
private and collective life because there are fewer and fewer
multipurpose rooms; overcharging for hot water. We see, the fight must
be waged on all scales and thanks to mobilization, the balance of power
remains present.
Another struggle, that around home canteens. They were created when the
first homes appeared in the 1960s. Residents, often West Africans, then
came together to ask acquaintances, unemployed women, to collectively
prepare the kitchen for them. This system is based on the pooling of
expenses and gradually, these very inexpensive canteens - 3 euros for a
well-served chicken rice - are integrated into homes while remaining
self-managed at the level of resident committees. Work there is often
undeclared, with teams of two people per household operating every other
week on a rotating basis. Today, some places have been regularized with
associations while other less formal canteens continue to operate with
an opening to the neighborhood because other workers come to eat there.
But now Adoma is threatening to close everything as part of the
rehabilitation of homes which are becoming "social residences" where
collective kitchens are removed - and also saying that employment
contracts must be regularized... This has had takes place at the Bara
home but the social restaurant is maintained within a squat in
Montreuil. At the Edouard Branly home, the fight is underway to maintain
a popular, self-managed and social canteen.
Sources: COPAF, press releases from residents' committees
In June 2023, a shipwreck off the island of Pylos caused more than 600
deaths. The blame lies largely with the Greek coast guard who pushed the
old, crowded trawler back to sea while the European agency Frontex
turned a blind eye to this illegal practice. Faced with the tragedy,
those responsible were sought but on the side of the migrants! Thus,
among the 104 survivors, 9 men were arrested and accused of migrant
smuggling and criminal organization having caused the accident. They
have just spent a year in prison and their trial has just taken place.
In Greece, a large solidarity movement was formed around the anti-racist
and anti-fascist coalition KEERFA, the Pakistani community and the
Egyptian community - communities of origin of the accused.
Demonstrations were organized, a fund was set up to attend the hearing
in the south of the country, in Kalamata. The trial was expeditious in a
good way, because from the first day, the judge decided to acquit the 9
people but not out of militant commitment or humanist kindness: the case
was closed because the boat sank outside territorial waters Greeks. Move
around, there's nothing more to see! Except that the supporters do not
want to stop there and are trying to ride the wave of support to indict
the real people responsible for this tragedy: Frontex and the Greek
coast guard. The mobilization is intended to be international,
particularly in France because the director of the European agency for
monitoring the EU's external borders was at the time Fabrice Leggeri -
who also had to resign in 2022 following revelations on the policy of
the agency covering systematic pushbacks of boats. The guy has bounced
back because today, he will surely be a European deputy because he is in
third position on the National Rally list for the European elections. In
the meantime, the Human Rights League and Utopia 56 have filed a
complaint for crimes against humanity against him. Amnesty International
is already supporting the call for rallies across Europe on June 14. In
Paris, there will a priori be a demonstration from Place du Trocadéro to
the Greek embassy. To be continued even if Leggeri goes to hide in
Strasbourg.
Source: the solidarity march
News from the Belleville park youth collective...
We have already talked about it in these columns, several hundred
unaccompanied minors gathered in a park in Belleville in Paris and
numerous supports were formed around them to become an important
collective of struggle. From then on, actions are carried out regularly
to demand housing and the State to take these young people into account.
Since April, more than 150 minors have occupied the Maison des Metallos,
a cultural space in Paris town hall. AGMs are organized there with also
demonstrations like that of May 17 in front of the Île de France
prefecture. But the threats of eviction are coming and as we write these
lines (May 25), the summons to the Administrative Court for the eviction
procedure initiated by the city of Paris have been posted by the cops.
For the record, the Paris City Hall, which is playing the "we're not the
bad guys" card, wants to put pressure on the prefecture, but by
evicting... The thing that is kept silent is that the place must be used
during the Olympic Games this summer! While awaiting the legal outcome
and the probable expulsion, the balance of power remains significant
because the site is still occupied with minors but also supporters. Here
is their demand: dignified accommodation in Paris where they can stay
until recourse is exhausted (for the recognition of the minority), so
that they can be together and in contact with solidarity networks,
unions and associations; an accommodation certificate allowing them to
travel without being disturbed by the police, particularly during the
Olympics; dignified medical coverage and the creation of a dedicated
health center with day reception, care center, psychologists, laundry,
canteen and bathrooms; access to solidarity restaurants in the City of
Paris for food; access to Public Education and schooling without
conditions; free access to culture; access to free transport like all
minors in Île-de-France; respect for the presumption of minority; the
drastic shortening of the duration of appeals.
Source: press release from the Belleville youth collective
For several months now, homeless people and migrants from the
Ile-de-France region have been sent to "sas" or "temporary reception
areas" spread across all French regions but far from the capital so as
not to spoil the photo of the Olympic Games. bourgeois. In mid-April,
the largest squat south of Paris, where more than 450 people were
housed, was evicted in Vitry-sur-Seine. In this abandoned company, 80%
of the residents are in fact in a regular situation but cannot find
housing because they do not have the means for private housing and are
waiting for social housing. Since then, those displaced have been
scattered without a lasting housing solution, as usual! At the beginning
of May, 7 rue Baudin in Pré Saint Gervais was evicted after two weeks of
occupation by the Unibéton collective. This collective named after the
former occupied place (see our previous sections) is made up of rejected
asylum seekers and refugees, already expelled from Saint-Denis Island in
April 2023, and from Rosny-sous-Bois in September 2023. Finally,
sometimes the expulsion takes place even before the judgment is
pronounced as was the case in Montreuil, at the end of May while the
trial was to take place on June 19. It was an associative squat which
also hosted artist workshops, the Palestine emergency collective and
even the neighborhood assembly. Upstairs, 17 undocumented immigrants
were housed, mainly people from other expulsions. The government was
surely afraid of this coalition and wanted to completely break
solidarity. Currently, there is not a week without expulsions in Île de
France.
Source: struggle press releases
The EU continues to lock its external borders
In these electoral times, it is important to remember that the European
Union is an area of free movement with variable geometry. No borders for
goods in the name of liberalism, that still works for European citizens
(but only in the Schengen area), but for external migrants, it is much
less "ode to joy" (the official anthem of the EU) ... Indeed, bilateral
agreements with countries, particularly African ones, are signed in the
"money for development aid against retention of illegal migrants" mode.
We have already talked about these bargains many times in this section.
Recently, the press discovered the refoulement into the desert of exiles
in Morocco, Tunisia and Mauritania. Since 2015, these 3 states have
received 400 million euros from the FFU - emergency trust fund - for
border control. In Morocco, according to official figures, more than
59,000 migrants were arrested in 2023. According to testimonies, there
are real roundups that are carried out based on their facial features.
Some of these sub-Saharan migrants are deported south. And there are
deaths, thirsty in the desert: at least 29 people since the start of the
year according to a United Nations report in Libya.
On the other side of the Mediterranean, fifteen European countries led
by Denmark and the Czech Republic are pleading with the European
Commission to send migrants to third countries, like the agreement
passed. between Italy and Albania. But the legal notion of "safe third
country" which governs European law is debated. Currently, an immigrant
arriving in the EU can be sent to an external country where they could
have applied for asylum, provided they have a sufficient link with that
third country. Which excludes at this stage a United Kingdom/Rwanda type
model. More generally, these countries want to increase agreements with
third countries located along migratory routes, citing as an example
partnerships already concluded, such as that with Turkey to retain
Syrian refugees in 2016.
Source: Le Monde, Infomigrants
In mid-May, ten people held at the CRA in Sète - out of 28 places in
total - managed to free themselves from this place of deprivation. They
went through the attic and the roof, well done! In this same small CRA,
eight men had already escaped in April 2023, taking advantage of a fault
in the door locking magnet. Elsewhere, there were also other escapes
such as on the night of May 9 at the CRA in Lille-Lesquin where 7
detainees managed to evade the surveillance of the guards. In April, 10
foreigners escaped from the Oisel CRA in Seine-Maritime. A series of
good news but it should be remembered that in 2023, the number of
migrants locked up in CRAs increased from 46,955 people locked up
compared to 43,565 in 2022, as did the average duration of confinement
which is 28.5 days - the maximum provided by law is 90 days (figures
from Cimade and France Terre d'Asile)
Various sources
While the law came into force on April 22 and the first arrests and
steps began to send migrants to Rwanda, a mobilization was organized
against it: humanitarian mobilizations but also exiles themselves. In
mid-May, migrants, mainly Afghans, demonstrated in front of the British
Parliament. They want to be removed from the deportable list. There are
also mobilizations in certain detention centers such as Brook House, in
south London where around fifty detainees demonstrated. In another
center, near Heathrow airport, around ten detainees began a hunger
strike. More generally, a major national demonstration is announced on
June 29 at the call of associations, NGOs and unions. Ignoring this
opposition, the government wants to maintain its course and plans the
first expulsions from July and hopes to deport at least 5,700 people by
the end of the year.
Source: Infomigrants
Attal announces this reform for before summer. This involves
transforming state medical aid into emergency medical aid (AMU). As a
reminder, the AME allows access to health for undocumented immigrants.
But be careful, under conditions which are already quite drastic. For
example, the system is not accessible to people in an irregular
situation who have resources greater than 847 euros per month, including
many workers who contribute and yet find themselves deprived of their
benefits.
health coverage. With the reform, it is a question of toughening these
conditions even further. The new calculation of resources would result
in an outright withdrawal from all health coverage of an undocumented
person in a relationship with a French or foreign spouse in a regular
situation, whose cumulative monthly resources would exceed the threshold
of 1,271 euros. This will lead to increased situations of marital
control and dependence. Other obstacles: the limitation of proof of
identity documents to photo documents only, and the exclusion of
association certificates, the extension of the physical submission of
renewal applications at the administration counter (this is currently
compulsory only for the first request); the reinstatement of a franchise
or stamp duty. In Paris, there will a priori be a demonstration from
Place du Trocadéro to the Greek embassy. To be continued even if Leggeri
goes to hide in Strasbourg.
Source: the solidarity march
News from the Belleville park youth collective...
We see that everything is being done to make the procedures even more
complex, while increasing the administrative work of Health Insurance.
All this will increase the rate of abandonment of procedures which was
already 50% in 2019 according to an inter-association study. However,
the AME is not an additional cost as some politicians announce.
Institutional studies say it: the system is necessary for the protection
of individual and public health, its budget is under control - it
represents less than 0.5% of the Health Insurance budget, a stable
proportion for years. The last report on this subject was published in
December 2023 and produced, among others, by Claude Evin, ex-minister of
health who refutes the fantasy of "fraud" and that of "the pull of air".
To oppose this reform, a collective of around thirty social and
humanitarian organizations has been formed and mobilizations can be
expected. For this collective, the only acceptable measure is "the
establishment of a Vitale card for AME users, the only consensual and
realistic solution to promote access to care for the most precarious,
reduce the administrative work of caregivers and Medicare and
strengthening our public health."
Source: Tribune du collective dans le Monde
http://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4207
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