Bencivenga Occupato – Dark Nights

We receive and publish a series of texts and materials distributed during the initiative in solidarity with the Chilean prisoners, held at the Bencivenga Occupato on November 26, 2021. Two booklets: one on the hunger strike conducted by prisoners in Chile, the other is a collection of texts, many translated from the magazine Kalinov Most, which were intended to better focus the topics of the debate: the specific reality of Chilean prisons, solidarity, fight against prison. There are also two contributions of Juan and Alfredo for the initiative, which they asked to be disseminated.

UNTIL THE DESTRUCTION OF THE PRISON-SOCIETY

(leaflet of introduction to the debate distributed during the initiative)

This initiative was born with the need to send, in our own small way, a gesture of solidarity to the comrades prisoners in Chile who in the first months of this year have undertaken two hard hunger strikes. We want to support them, also through the translations contained in the pamphlets prepared for this meeting, by spreading the determination with which they have carried out their struggle inside the prison, with the aim of feeling it closer to us who are outside those walls and far from those territories. Although at the end of their mobilization the prisoners did not get all that they demanded, it still allowed them to build and establish bonds of complicity, both inside and outside the prison. Ties that have made this struggle transcend barriers and borders and that, since it has clearly positioned itself against all forms of coercion and domination, have made it recognizable and vindicable by refractory people all over the world.

But it is not for simple voyeurism towards distant rebellions that we are here today. With this initiative we also intend to underline our complicity with our comrades who today are prisoners of the State, so that they know that they are not alone. Also in this part of the world we have anarchist prisoners who have recently conducted several struggles inside the prison. Struggles conducted individually or collectively, strikes and mass uprisings such as those of March 2020 against pandemic management inside prisons. Struggles whose quality, to take up a concept expressed with emphasis in the contribution that Juan, a prisoner in the Terni prison, wrote for this initiative, is closely related to the relationships that exist between inside and outside the prison. These relationships are the same on which prisoners and Chilean comrades have repeatedly insisted, stating that “the prison is part of the options of the struggle, it is part of it and therefore, instead of being a parenthesis or a pause, it is configured as one more scenario in which to carry out the clash” and that it is necessary to understand “the prisoner as an active comrade, in struggle, who is in this particular condition as a result of a chosen path that does not end within [those] four walls”. Relationships in which it is necessary to invest if we want to recognize a prisoner as our comrade, as a complicit in the struggle against all power, especially at this time when these relationships are under attack. The latest repressive operations in Italy have in fact, among others, the purpose of hitting the communication between the world outside and inside the prison, putting pressure on the epistolary communication through which prisoners continue to be part of the anarchist debate and struggle, providing reflections, contributions, proposals for action and stimuli for action. Now more than ever it is therefore the time to increase efforts in the direction of greater communication and complicity with the prisoners, having as its objective not mere support in the charitable way, but rather the reinforcement of our offensive capacity against this system of domination and exploitation. Continue reading “Rome, Italy: Texts and materials distributed during the initiative of 26/11/21 at Bencivenga + Contributions of Alfredo Cospito and Juan Sorroche” →

January 2022

As we approach the end of the trial of Operation Bialystok, it seems to us to be the right moment to spread some considerations on its progress. Although we are not interested in following the pace dictated by repression, nor in taking a victimistic or alarmist stance in the face of the activities of police institutions, we believe it is important to share information and impressions about what is happening at the court level. By conscious choice, we will summarize aspects and moments that we consider noteworthy, at the expense of a detailed and chronological description of the trial in which we are involved.

As far as the framework of the investigation is concerned, we refer to the texts “Sull’operazione Bialystok” (On the Bialystok operation) already published and circulated on the web and “Testo e contesto” (Text and context).

At the time of writing all defendants in this proceeding are at large. On January 27th a positive response was received to a request for the end of the precautionary measures to which 4 defendants were still subject (3 obligations to stay and one obligation to present themselves for weekly signatures), so that at the moment only one person remains under obligations to stay. The differences in conditions are mainly due to the different timing in the presentation of the appeals which brought the same before different courts, and to the specificity of the individual positions regarding the crimes charged.

Broadly speaking, up to now the process has been marked by hours and hours of endless hearings for the delineation of the anarchist context both nationally and internationally, hearings where we defendants have almost never been nominated. Only after many hearings did we begin to talk about the so-called specific facts. There was a certain interest and prominence in the moments in which the international relations of the defendants were exposed; this was not because the prosecution brought who knows what elements, on the contrary, we witnessed a real climbing on mirrors, but more because of the play of roles within the institution of justice. It is evident that an assize court, used to dealing with crimes of a certain gravity, sees in the international dimension of the investigation the possibility of its own raison d’être. And this, we say, on the level of the actual courtroom show; behind the scenes, that is, on the level of the investigation, and therefore of the repressive strategy, we also see something else, that is, a direction that looks like it wants to be taken in the future. These, like others in the past, are attempts, sometimes successful and sometimes less so, to structure on a concrete level the collaboration of police and prosecutors’ offices on an international level regarding investigations. Continue reading “Italy: Measure and process updates for Operation Bialystok” →