(en) Sweden, Stockholm, Megafonen statement on Stockholm riots

Open letter from the Pantrarnas skrivgrupp (an anti-authoritarian community organizing 
group in Gothenburg) to their sister group Megafonen in Stockholm ---- First and foremost 
we are writing this for our brothers and sisters in Megafonen. We were speaking on the 
phone just now, and suddenly you stopped in the middle of a sentence, saying:--- "There's 
another car burning, we got to go". --- You are standing in the middle of the storm. Your 
world is burning. And we are writing this to tell you that we know what you are going 
through, that we admire how you've handled the events of the last few days. ---- A couple 
of years ago cars were burning in Biskopsg?rden. The cops did as they pleased those 
nights, and at the break of dawn the politicians did the same with words.

You know the score: the burnt-out cars, the broken glass on the streets: it seems like 
such an easy thing to condemn if you're seeing it from the outside. And now, that's what 
they demand from you when you are trying to say something about this uprising: you can 
never be allowed try to explain, you are just to join in the choir of condemnations; the 
choir saying that burning a car, smashing a window, is something unforgivable. But no 
matter what you say, it'll never be enough. For them, you'll never be able to write and 
say it enough times, despite having written and spoken about this so many times before: 
that you do not believe violence is a suitable method for achieving social change.

In TV studios and on the net, you are again and again doing the right thing when you 
persist in explaining the fires instead of just delivering blanket condemnations of the 
youths. Because those who condemn actions without trying to explain them are also 
condemning the thoughts and experiences that gave rise to these actions.

To those of you who are watching these events from the outside

we write this to ask you: Can you understand the hand which throws a rock at a police car? 
Could you even try to?

Imagine yourself as a kid, bullied for your accent and the way you look. The alienation. 
Pointless teachers sitting behind their desks earning their pointless wage. By lighting 
your first cigarette in primary you are hoping to become more accepted. You start hanging 
out with friends and together you try to roll with it. You become shaped by what you see.

Being strong is hard if there are no role models around. Maybe you don't have as good 
contact with your family as you could have. Maybe you lost your mother or father during 
the war in Iraq. Maybe you lost your siblings during the war in Afghanistan. War-injured 
in Palestine.

During your teenage years, there's nobody there to listen to you. There's no one you can 
turn to. You are trying to make a life for yourself, but there's nothing to do. You apply 
for job after job, but Daniel Svensson is chosen ahead of you every fucking single time. 
You start losing heart. Try to seek out other ways. Some of you end up taking a wrong 
turn, others come out OK.

There are many voices saying that you have to make it for yourself, but things aren't that 
easy. The pigs are constantly harassing you. Weed is abundant. There is an itching 
temptation in your hand. Will you do it, or back off? Mounting peer pressure, and you find 
yourself agreeing to things you'd never do on your own. You feel as if there's no future 
for you. You're standing there with a rock in your hand. You're standing there with your 
life in your hands. Are you going to throw?

Megafonen. We think you are correct in judging the events in your suburb this last week a 
community uprising. We believe it is correct to point out that what we are dealing with 
are youth riots, nor nonpolitical disturbances, but precisely an uprising; a reaction, 
which is what you wrote in your last communique: "unemployment, substandard schools, and 
structural racism are the root causes to today's events".

When you find yourselves wavering, ask yourself this: what had this week been like if you 
hadn't been there? Maybe a retired old man had been shot to death in his apartment in a 
suburb and no one would have cared. Maybe. That's an answer: if you hadn't taken a picture 
of the body bag that was smuggled out in the middle of the night, despite police claims 
that the man had died at a hospital several hours before?then perhaps no one would have 
cared, and it would all have been back to business as usual.

But caring about someone dying is doing the right thing. Demanding truth instead of lies 
when police talk to media about a dead body is doing the right thing.

When you organized the protest which some critics now single out as the spark which 
ignited the flames of revolt in the suburbs, you were doing the right thing.

Ask yourselves this: what is there to connect H?sselby or Fittja?where the summer night 
fires are also burning?with the man who was shot to death in an apartment in Husby? 
Nothing, maybe. What connection do you members of Megafonen have to the deceased? You 
didn't know him, he wasn't a relative. But there's something that connects us all. We feel 
sorrow when one of us dies. We stand in solidarity with each other. We live together, in 
our community.

We support you in every possible way. We know how frustrating it can feel standing where 
you are now standing, steadfastly trying to explain rather than condemn.

In Hammarkullen there are sometimes mounted police at the square. In Biskopsg?rden there 
are CCTV cameras that register whatever happens in the court yards. In Fr?lunda there are 
now rumors of commotions?calls and text messages whispering that maybe the uprising is 
spreading to Gothenburg, where we are struggling with the same kinds of problems as you in 
Stockholm: the militarization of the suburbs, the police brutality, the social regression. 
Summer is coming; yet another year. The sound of mopeds buzzing back and forth between the 
tower blocks. There's always this suffocating feeling in the suburbs. You know. The 
feeling that there's nobody listening, that no one is interested in stories about racist 
police, harassment, brutality. The feeling that maybe it takes fire for certain voices to 
be heard.

Now there are fires. We are standing here, together. Pantrarna and Megafonen.

If we didn't exist, who would then have taken on the responsibility of trying to 
understand the shadows roaming our streets with rocks in hand? These shadows who were born 
in Swedish hospitals and consequently registered at the Swedish tax agency; these shadows 
who have attended Swedish schools and who have hung out in youth Swedish youth centers and 
who want to work, pay taxes and die in this country, shadows that our Prime Minister still 
is capable of transforming into strangers by saying that their actions are the product of 
"cultural thresholds" - and as you, our friends in Megafonen, know, this is the only way 
in which he has attempted to explain the uprising: it's all about angry, young men that 
just need to overcome certain cultural thresholds in order to gain access to our broader 
society.

There's no need for us to point out the banality and racism of this statement.

There are shadows moving in this nation.

To all the politicians of Sweden...

we instead write this:

The people elected you. The people is all of us, together. The police are abusing their 
power and look upon us who have no uniform as dirt. That's why we call the pigs. It's as 
simple as that. We have grown tired of constantly hearing those in power repeating a 
limited number of words that mean exactly nothing. Take action instead of just talking. Be 
of some use. For example, you could establish an independent agency for investigating the 
police.

It is you who are in power, after all ? so do something to help the people who elected you 
to sit there raking in the millions of kronor to your bank accounts. The crap wages the 
teachers get make them lose hope. They sit behind their teacher's desk without giving a 
damn. And so on. Cause and effect. If you insist on reducing every single political 
question to a police matter, then maybe we just should start electing police instead of 
politicians.

Yet another part of society died in that Husby apartment. That's why there are fires.

But you already knew that.

Finally. To all kids of the community out there in the streets.

All our brothers and sisters. Just stay cool. Of course, media will stop reporting when 
things have cooled down in your community. They will pack their stuff and disappear for 
now. They're not interested in listening to your voices, your stories of police brutality, 
run-down schools, housing in need of restoration, closed-down community centers, 
discrimination. What they want are the burning cars, the smashed windows. That's why you 
have to go on reporting on your lives for yourselves when this uprising is over.

Media will inevitably malign your communities and write falsehoods.

Demand corrections.

There's one thing we might learn from this. Our voices do count. And if there's nobody 
else to listen to us, then we just have to talk to each other.

The Sweden Democrats are likely to gain another few votes, but we can never let ourselves 
be silenced. We will never shut up, we will speak, together. If they sow your lips shut, 
then you'll have to cut the stitches using your voices.

Our pockets might be penniless, but our eyes are rich.

All power to the people.

Homa Badpa

Murat Solmaz

Pantrarna f?r upprustning av f?rorten

--
Med v?nliga h?lsningar
Mikael Altemark

Voorstad van Stockholm zet zich schrap voor oproep tot het vrijdaggebed vanaf de minaret

In Zweden heeft het planningscomité van Botkyrka, een voorstad van Stockholm, de weg vrijgemaakt voor de plaatselijke moskee om tot het vrijdaggebed op te roepen vanaf de minaret. Later op de maand wordt het voorstel op de gemeenteraad gestemd. Het gaat om een primeur, want nergens anders in Zweden is dat het geval. Een verbod op gebedsoproepen van 1994 zou daarmee van de baan zijn.

Op de christendemocraten na stemden alle politieke partijen in het planningscomité voor het voorstel. Volgens de christendemocraten zijn de andere partijen bang om moslimkiezers te verliezen.

De zaak kwam op de agenda nadat de voorzitter van de Botkyrka Islamitische Vereniging, Ismail Okur, een petitie daartoe richtte aan de gemeenteraad.

‘We wonen al ons hele leven in Zweden, we betalen belasting, we zijn goede burgers, we hebben Zweden veel gegeven. Nu willen we daarvoor een klein beetje terug hebben, we willen onze godsdienstvrijheid’.

Op de stelling dat Zweden een overwegend christelijk land is antwoordt Okur: "Dat was misschien vroeger zo, in de jaren 1930 en 1940. Nu is een ander tijdperk.’

Indien Botkyrka het voorstel goedkeurt, staan al verschillende andere moskeeverenigingen klaar om ook in hun gemeente eenzelfde aanvraag in te dienen.

Toch gaat het geenszins om een Europese primeur. In 2009 berichtte het Nederlandse televisieprogramma Netwerk dat er tenminste tien plaatsen in Nederland zijn waar moskeeën staan die oproepen voor het vrijdagmiddag-gebed.

In België trok de moskeevereniging van Beringen begin 2010 zelf de aanvraag voor soortgelijke toelating in, nadat het negatieve reacties regende, ‘niet enkel uit de hoek van het Vlaams Belang Beringen, maar ook van inwoners.'

Zwitserland keurde in 2009  zelfs een totaal verbod op de bouw van minaretten goed.

In onderstaande film is te zien hoe de burgervereniging Bloc Identitaire Aquitaine in 2009 een ludieke protestactie organiseerde tegen de bouw van een moskee in Bordeaux. Om zes uur 's ochtends galmde een gebedsoproep door de ganse stad:

Bron : Express.be

No Border Stockholm

Hello,

Recently the government of Iraq decided to stop all forced deportations to
the country. This decision was conveyed to the Swedish embassy in Baghdad.
However, the government of Sweden and the Swedish Migration Board keep
deporting people there. Right now a new massdeportation from Sweden to
Baghdad is planned, possibly on the 17th of October.

To date 1730 Iraqis have been sent to Iraq with chartered airplanes. In
the beginning the deportations were a Frontex project but now Sweden is
the only country that keeps deporting Iraqis in groups. During the past
three years one chartered plane per month has left Swedish grounds bound
for Iraq. This has been done without much media attention and with
anonymous white buses, in order to protect the praticipating bus
companies.

Last week the chairman of the Iraqi parlament, Osama Al Najaf, the Iraqi
foreign minister Hoshyar Zebari and the Brittish foreign minister William
Hague met in order to discuss forced deportations of Iraqi asylum seekers.
Iraq strongly ciritices European countries that carry out forced
deportations of Iraqis.

http://www.alsumarianews.com/ar/iraq-politics-news/-1-47841.htm

The prime minister of Iraq is right now in Sweden on an official visit,
however the meeting with the Swedish migration minister and the government
is kept secret.

During the week before the coming massdeportation we will do our best to
put light on what is going on but we need your help! This is a call out to
groups all over Europe to carry out protest actions outside Swedish
embassies, demanding that Sweden stops the massdeportions to Iraq.
Please send reports, articles and pictures from the protests to
antidep@gmail.com.

It is also of great help if Swedish media is made aware of protests that
occur in other countries. Press releases, articles etc can be sent to any
or all of the following media: red.skane@metro.se, redaktion@skd.se,
sydnytt@svt.se, sydsvenskan@sydsvenskan.se, p1morgon@sr.se,
lars.linder@dn.se, caroline.goransson@svt.se,
petter.larsson@efterarbetet.se, konflikt@sr.se,
alex.schulman@aftonbladet.se, mikael.funke@sydsvenskan.se,
linda.petersson@tv4.se, ramin.farzin@sverigesradio.se,
71000@aftonbladet.se, tipsa@svd.se, redaktion@city.se,
internetred@sydsvenskan.se, internet@hd.se, p3morgonpasset@sr.se,
peter.f.andersson@hd.se, brith.lindahl@hd.se,
nyheterna.kristianstad@sverigesradio.se, red.skane@metro.se,
redaktion@skd.se, sydnytt@svt.se, sydsvenskan@sydsvenskan.se,
p1morgon@sr.se, lars.linder@dn.se, caroline.goransson@svt.se,
tomas.ramberg@sverigesradio.se, kaliber@sverigesradio.se,
p1morgon@sverigesradio.se

We will also update our website and facebook regularly with pictures and
info from the actions!!

Thanks!

//
Aktion mot deportation

www.aktionmotdeportation.se

No Border Camp Stockholm (Zweden)

Meer ... later

Beste vrienden,

jullie zullen alvast gemerkt hebben dat ik de laatste tijd weinig op fb zat ... In No Border camp te Stockholm (Zweden ) was er amper internet verbinding.
Terug in Brussel krijgen jullie van mij , via mijn blog , http://luc-schrijvers.blogspot.com/ , het hele verhaal te horen.
Maar nu gisterenavond ben ik zwaar ten val gekomen in het hostel , gelegen midden in het centrum van Stockholm. Ik ben van de trappen gevallen en kwam terecht op mijn zitvlak en onderrug ... Ook mijn uiterst teentje van mijn linkervoet is gewond. Tijdens het kamp zelf had in infecties opgelopen aan mijn beide voeten. Ik kon met moeite gaan ... en nu dit er nog bij .... Nu staat er mij een busreis te wachten van 27 uur .. Terug naar Brussel ... Als ik terug in Brussel ben ga ik naar het ziekenhuis om enkele onderzoeken te laten doen.

Wat ik al kan zeggen van het kamp ... ik heb zeer veel lieve mensen ontmoet .die begaan zijn met lot van duizenden vluchtelingen ... Solidariteit is niet zomaar een woord .. het is een werkwoord .. voor mij altans..

Tot in Brussel ...

Luc Schrijvers

No Border Camp 2012. Stockholm, 17-24 June 2012

Call out


This text is also available in: French, German, Italian, Spanish, Bosnian, Finnish, Greek, Polish, Portuguese (Portugal), Swedish

TRANSNATIONAL NO BORDER CAMP STOCKHOLM 17/6 – 24/6 2012

Borders kill
Borders are big business
Borders are in Stockholm

12 million refugees are in the world today.
235 900 people applied for asylum in EU in 2010 but only few were permissible to stay.
2000 people died in the Mediterranean sea in 2011 when they tried to reach EU from Libya and Tunisia.

WHAT IS A NO BORDER CAMP?

Since the 1990s, action camps have been taking place under the name ‘No border’ to put focus on the borders that separate people. Regardless of whether the focus has been borders that the state maintains or those that capitalism establishes, the camps have served as autonomous free zones – built by people to bring together all the various fights against borders and migration policies, to share knowledge and experiences and take direct action against an authoritarian society, of which borders are the most visible manifestation.

No Border is no organization but a concept, an idea. It is about fighting for a world without borders, where everyone has the possibility and no one is restricted from moving freely across the globe without ever being called illegal.

WHY IN STOCKHOLM?

Borders affect us all, yet they affect us differently depending on gender, class and ethnicity. The violence and control of the state does not only occur at external border zones but also at airports, hospitals, ports, subways, schools, work places, streets and squares. It is spreading like a poison gas in the air we breath and becomes a part of our daily life. The constant hunt for non-European migrants legitimizes persecution of everyone who does not seem to fit in. Borders create racism.

Border politics is joint within the EU and Sweden has a active role in this. In the European Union non-European persons who cross borders are being criminalized, put in prison and deported: migration is talked about as a security threat these days. In Sweden it is also bound to be more effective and cheap. It is made more effective through specially trained plain clothes cops working together with the tax office who conducts raids in work places, quicker decisions and executive deportation orders, and co-ordinated mass deportation in joint FRONTEX flights. This year the deportations increased 40 %.

People in the insecure situation which the borders create are exploited by capitalism. It creates workers who are a cheap and an expendable work force for the state and it’s private contractors. Workers who are exploited while at the same time being used for undermining salary levels and the social safety nets. Border politics enable corporations to make big money on serving the state’s deportation machinery with control services, identification and surveillance because of a security need the border politics have invented.

The violence of the borders are always kept silenced. In closed of arrests people are being led with handcuffs, diapers and stuffed with sedatives to a waiting plane from the cargo entry. The detention centers are built in the outskirts of cities, hidden in industrial areas or far away from the public eye. Corporations can without a problem make money with no responsibility in an extremely well paid sector.

But this is something we never have a moral obligation to accept or maintain. Borders are constantly unmade by being crossed without the right papers; the system of citizenship challenged by persons trying to exist in spaces without citizenship; walls overpowered by being climbed over and escaped from. We call upon all people to take their rage against the borders to the streets in Stockholm and break the silence by confronting the border violence. We call upon a week of direct action against the border- and security politics. Come to Stockholm and show your resistance and dissent against racism and your love for a world without borders, control and papers. Come and destroy what’s oppressing us and create something new.

WHAT ARE THE GOALS OF THE CAMP AND IT’S ACTIONS?

To highlight and act against the corporations and capital interests that supports the state’s migration policies while also profiting from the deportation machinery
To share our experiences and skills and together build on our knowledge to better be able to conduct solidarity campaigns and fight the nation state and it’s policies on migration.
To advance the argument of freedom of movement and a world without borders into the public debate.
WHEN?

Construction of the camp will start on the second week of June
The camp will start from the 17th of June and will go on until the 24th
On the 17th of June there will be a mass demonstration in central Stockholm for a world without borders
On the 18th there will be a solidarity action with the people detained in the detention center in Märsta
During the week actions are also being planned against detention- and deportations profiteers, repression, companies who exploit migrant workers and the security complex.

PRINCIPLES OF THE CAMP:

The camp philosophy is self-organization, decentralization and autonomy. The camp clearly rejects capitalism, which feed on war and misery, and depends on the nation state and its borders to survive.
All participants of the camp are expected to respect different political options and actions. We have solidarity with all participants and do not distance ourselves for personal or political gain, respecting all tactics.
All participants of the camp are expected to stand in solidarity together against all forms of repression.
Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic or any other types of oppression and domination are not welcome, and will not be tolerated, at the camp.
The camp stands in confrontation with any authoritative structures, and wants through direct action to resist against these structures and provide an alternative.
Repression is something that affects us all. Borders represent a part of a struggle that also includes, but not limits itself to, anti-fascism, class struggle, environmental struggles, animal rights struggles, feminist and queer struggles. We encourage all groups, organizations, collectives and individuals to conduct decentralized actions throughout the week of the camp or in any other way possible take action against migration politics!

HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT AND HELP WITH THE CAMP?

A self-organized camp will be nothing but what we make of it. Everyone is able to participate and find their own roles in making a No Border camp happen!

You can take part in the organization of the camp by getting involved in one of the working groups (logistics, mobilization, media, workshop program, the mass-demonstration on the 17th June, translations, medical aid, legal team, website, graphics etc.)
You can help us by suggesting a workshop, movie screening, presentation or something similar. The theme should be relating to migration or border politics.
You can mobilize, block deportations, show up at the camp, join the big demonstration, visit people in detention centers or find other creative solutions for inflicting damage on the deportation machine.
You can organize a support party, a support concert or arrange other activities for supporting and raise funds for the camp.
You can help us finding a location for the camp or other places for activist activities.
You can donate money, skills or material
You can lend us much-needed logistics (larger tents, vans, construction materials, etc.)

www.noborderstockholm.org
info@noborderstockholm.org
Account (PostGiro): 62 88 02 – 1
IBAN: SE49 9500 0099 6042 0628 8021
BIC (swift-adress): NDEASESS

No Border Camp : soirée d'info et mobilisation

mardi 08 mai 2012 18:00

 Publié: lundi 30 avril 2012 15:11 par no border

CSOA Passe Partout
rue Hocheporte, 8
4000 Liège

Lieu:

Depuis les années 1990, des camps No Border ont eu lieu afin de mettre l'accent sur les frontières qui oppressent et séparent les gens. Peu importe si l'accent a été mis sur les frontières que l'État maintient ou celles que le capitalisme établit, les camps ont servi de zones franches autonomes, construites par des personnes afin de réunir tous les combats contre les frontières et les politiques migratoires, afin de partager connaissances et expériences, de prendre des mesures directes contre une société autoritaire dont les frontières sont une des manifestations les plus visibles.

No Border n'est pas une organisation, mais un concept, une idée. Il s'agit de la lutte pour un monde sans frontières, où chacun-e a la possibilité de se déplacer librement à travers le monde sans jamais être qualifié d'illégalE, de clandestinE. No Border est un réseau constitué de collectifs et d'individus.

En 2012, deux camps sont prévus. Tout le monde peut y participer, du bambin à la grand-mère : tout le monde peut s'engager sous différentes formes pour lutter contre les expulsions de masse, Frontex, le post-colonialisme et ses effets directs, le racisme ordinaire et les discours de l?extrême-droite ou de partis de toute sorte instituant le racisme, etc.

*Pourquoi un camp No Border en 2012 ?*

- Pour rendre plus facile les passages et la vie des personnes en transition

- Informer localement les habitantEs de la vie de ces migrants et du pourquoi de leur présence

- Apprendre l'anglais, l'allemand, le français aux migrants (surtout face à la police, car on se rend compte qu'avec quelques mots appris on se fait moins frapper)

- Rendre public ce qu'il se passe par le biais de manifestations, de blocages de centres de rétention

- Permettre des abris avec l'ouverture de locaux et de squats

- Surveiller et filmer les interventions policières violentes, prévenir les migrants de raids?

- Faire naître des liens, des alliances?

En 2012, pour passer vos prochaines vacances, *du 17 au 24 juin à Stockholm et du 13 au 22 juillet à Cologne-Düsseldorf*, il y a ces deux camps No Border ! Et comme le disent les No Borders de Stockholm : « La guerre est partout, elle se fait chaque jour, à chaque endroit où on considère qu'il y a des gens qui n'en dépendent pas. L'Europe fait appel à la guerre du contrôle, le contrôle est appelé sécurité, la sécurité est appelée chose saine. Les frontières sont partout. »

« Laissez le mouvement No Border détruire tout ce qui est reconnu comme normal. Venez pour détruire et créer. »

Bron :

bxl.indymedia.org

http://www.noborderstockholm.org/fr/

http://noborder.antira.info