Gentrification

Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for arson of a UNISON vehicle

Posted on 2022/09/28 by darknights

UNISON is an environmental killer company carrying out Bakoyannis’ orders, with the aim, using saws, of wiping out everything wild that surrounds us. Its employees follow the orders of the cops. The rich want to see the world we dream of wiped out forever.

UNISON kills the trees and bushes, cuts the grass and branches to make our parks and streets more livable. To remove the possibility of hiding from the forces of repression. To facilitate evacuations of homeless people who take refuge in the wild darkness. Place lights to eliminate the darkness. For in the darkness the wild grows. The wild and the darkness scares them – the state, the rich, the cops, the culture.

The last UNISON attack was in Cyprus Park in Patissia. They are also central to the current attacks against Strefis Hill and Drakopoulos Park. The company is also present at metro stations such as Omonia.

It was very nice to find one of their company vehicles parked on the streets of Metaxourgeio, at the corner of Paramythias and Mykalis streets. So in the early morning hours of September 27th we burned it, so they could pay a little bit of what they have taken.

Our attack is in the context of class warfare: while underpaid workers go to work on public transport, middle-class UNISON employees have company vehicles, representing their aggressive concept of a clean and safe metropolis. The location of our fire, in a neighbourhood suffering from a constant gentrification campaign that excludes the poor to establish another silly entertainment and airbnb district. And UNISON is a central part of this gentrification process across the city.

Anarchists

Source: athens.indymedia

Berlin, Germany: Arson attack on a vehicle of the Greek Embassy

Posted on 2022/09/07 - 2022/09/10 by darknights

Attentively we have followed how the Greek state crushes demonstrations in the streets of Athens. The government of Nea Dimokratia and its judiciary have proven that in the hunger strikes of D. Koufontinas and G. Michailidis, they are ready to let prisoners die rather than give in one step. We know the videos of the lynching with the participation of police officers of Zak Kostopoulos. As well as the execution of N. Sampanis in Perama by DIAS is an expression of a ruthless regime, as is the murder of Vassilis Maggos in Volos. Blood drips from the hands of the Greek authorities.

The new junta thinks it is smart to take advantage of the August vacation period to begin construction of the metro station in Exarcheia. Their goal is to destroy every social base and occupy every place of resistance with troops. The evictions of squats in Thessaloniki and the police invasion of the university there have not escaped us either.

Everywhere the Greek state encounters resistance from parts of society. We want to support this resistance in order to bring down the project of ND. The system of ND, its judiciary and its cops, is the state of rapists. The release of rapists and the simultaneous attack on a feminist demonstration in July in Athens, symbolizes the values of Mitsotakis’ government.

At the same time, the killings at Greece’s borders continue. In league with FRONTEX and mercenaries, Greek authorities are responsible for the daily deaths at the gates of the European fortress. Continue reading “Berlin, Germany: Arson attack on a vehicle of the Greek Embassy” →

Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for the attack on luxury hotels of Israeli interests

Posted on 2022/07/24 - 2022/07/24 by darknights

On Thursday 23/6/22, a group of comrades attacked and destroyed with hammers and sledgehammers the facades of three luxury hotels of Israeli interests located on Kleisovis Street in Exarcheia. In one of the hotels, paint was also thrown inside the hotel, where the dining room and wine-bar are located. Leaflets were thrown at the spot which read:

“TOURISTS GO HOME! This is class-war Zone” “Cops and big investors out of Exarcheia”

These hotels, with a cost of 100+ euros per day, like so many others that spring up every day in the area, are part of capital’s strategic planning to “gentrify” Exarchia and turn it into an investment philanthropy, where the human geography of the population will be shaped for the needs of capital.

The struggle for Exarcheia to remain a militant, multicultural neighbourhood, a symbol of resistance and rebellion, is going to be a tough one. It is a class struggle and it is about our survival both as workers and residents in the neighbourhood and the preservation of the revolutionary memory and the insurrectionary flame.

We support the struggles against the privatization of the Strefi Hill, against the construction of the metro in Exarcheia Square. We fight together with thousands for the Exarcheia of Social Self-Organization and Class Solidarity against the state repression, the violence of capital, the museumization of the Polytechnic, the drug mafias and the thugs who are an arm of capital and the state.

Comrades.

PS: We express our unconditional solidarity with the anarchist political prisoner G. Michailidis who is on 60 days of hunger strike demanding his freedom. Freedom or Death

Source: athens. indymedia

Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: Intervention at an airbnb

Posted on 2022/07/24 - 2022/07/24 by darknights

The analyses about the gentrification of the Exarcheia neighbourhood are now well known and part of the discourse and practice of the anti-authoritarian space. Evictions of houses, cop culture, frugal tourists that frolic undisturbed in their new playground. Squatter evictions, mega real estate companies, and so much more that we see in our neighborhood every day.

Gentrification is our violent exchange with first class citizens and visitors. For what purpose? For political deadening, for counter-insurgency, for profit. But the actions of our diverse movements will sweep them away once again.

As a minimal act of support for the struggle of Exarchia, we intervened in the airbnb on Tsamadou by throwing buckets of stinking paint into its courtyard and breaking the electric bells at the entrance. This building has been targeted many times with spray paint and so on, as it was the site of the Omokentro squat a few years ago. Also the homeless man who had been living across the street from the airbnb for a long time, suddenly disappeared from his place by magic… With a little talk with the neighborhood one understands that this man did not leave there by accident, but most likely he was evicted by the owners so as not to ‘spoil’ their image.

The targets are many and they are everywhere. Right down to the destruction of the last airbnb.

REDEVELOPMENT MEANS POOR DISPLACED PEOPLE

NO TO THE SUBWAY, REDEVELOPMENT OF THE HILLSIDE AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF LUXURY HOUSING

COPS – INVESTORS OUT OF THE NEIGHBORHOOD

angry neighbours

Source: athens.indymedia

Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for the arson of a UNISON vehicle

Posted on 2022/07/22 by darknights

On the 55th day of the hunger strike of Giannis Michailidis, we burned a UNISON vehicle in the area of Metaxourgiou, on Constantinople Street. To support the comrade in his struggle for freedom and as an effort to give strength to the movement in the coming days and nights.

UNISON is a company that collaborates with the municipality of Athens in the privatization and exploitation of parks and streets – with the end result being the death of life in all public spaces, and the transformation of the city into a commercialized Disneyland. The struggle to defend Exarcheia also necessitates an attack on UNISON, as it is responsible for the gentrification of Strefi Hill. The company has an open mandate to facilitate the cops in the repression of public spaces and the evacuation of squats. They are also part of the class war against the poor, as they rent workers. Instead of decent wages and working conditions, the company pays peanuts and violates workers’ rights, earning goodwill for their rich bosses and shareholders.

UNISON advertises on its vehicles that it is an “exclusive partner of ISS”. ISS is a Danish security and site management company that maintains prisons and immigration detention centres in Belgium and France, offers security on public transport, as well as “security solutions”, with workers or surveillance techniques on every dirty job.

The state, in its desire to take all ground from the anarchist space and the broader antagonistic movement, by evacuating squats, attacking universities, tear-gassing neighbourhoods, will face the transformation of the city into a battlefield. If the strike doesn’t end well, we will do everything to turn the next few weeks into a nightmare for those in charge, creating situations they can’t handle. Burning cars, interventions, banners, broken windows and clashes must become the experience of this tourist season.

Let’s burn the rich and their people

Some anarchists

Source: athens.indymedia

Athens, Greece: Spasm of solidarity with G. Michailidis, attack on luxury apartments HESTIA and the company Grivas/Integrated IT Solutions

Posted on 2022/07/03 by darknights

On Sunday night 25/6, we attacked the luxury apartments HESTIA and the company Grivas/Integrated IT Solutions by breaking their windows on Alexandra Avenue.

Since 23/05 the anarchist political prisoner G. Michailidis is on hunger strike from 23.23.2005. His request is his formal release from the cells of bourgeois democracy, as he has served all the formalities set by their laws. Nevertheless, in his person the state is taking revenge for his steadfast attitude of struggle, his continuation of the struggle, his choice of escape and “illegality” far from capitulating to the regime. Thus, it keeps him in prison indefinitely, activating the dreaming of the statists, i.e. the police of thought and the possible commission of new offences.

For our part, we have nothing more to say but to declare that we are on the side of the hunger striker. This is why we attacked these two places.On the one hand, luxury housing is a target in a neighbourhood (Exarchia and Areos Pedion) that is under an all-out attack of appropriation.Our neighbourhoods are becoming unlivable. Rents are reaching a ceiling higher than the salary. Airbnbs are popping up on every corner and evicting anything that spoils their street. The bosses squeeze the workers. Thus, the neighborhood of the parts in particular becomes an investment hotbed, with private citizens, democrats and cops attempting to run the show.

On the other hand, Grivas/Integrated IT Solutions is one of many that offer their services where the money flows abundantly. And of course this is nothing but war. So, it provides solutions and investigations to NATO and by extension with the war machine of the Greek state, while cooperating in the prosecution of migrant(s) with the Greek coast guard. All this at a time when transnational antagonisms are at their peak and now openly with war on European soil. Of course, we do not ignore all these wars of low or high intensity in the periphery of Europe, the Middle East, Africa, etc., but neither do we ignore the role played by the Greek state in the war and annihilation of migrants attempting to cross the borders.

Every day it becomes clearer that we are the meat for their cannons. That we must run out of wages just for rent and electricity. That we must obey every new or old discipline for our own good. That rapists, all kinds of squealing journalists, politicians, cops, the military must have a say over our lives; that we should oppose all of the above with solidarity, self-organization and resistance to the state and capital.

Freedom to the anarchist G. Michailidis, hunger striker since 23/05

We want immigrants in all neighbourhoods and not tourists on holiday

We don’t fight for the states and the bosses, but only against them

anarchists

Source: athens.indymedia

Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: Video from the Day X protest & riots to resist the occupation of Exarcheia square by cops and the building of a metro station

Posted on 2022/06/26 - 2022/06/26 by darknights

Exarchia, Saturday night, around 20:30, 26 June 2022. People are starting to gather in Exarchia Square for the march against gentrification, evictions, political denaturalization and state repression in Exarchia. In front of the astonished eyes of the assembled people 5-6 motorbikes of the police group DRASI are defiantly passing by Exarchia Square. Apart from voices denouncing this provocative move by the police and warning of the response they will get the next time they provoke, there is no aggressive move against the police.

What are the police officers going and doing on their part? They leave and come back with more reinforcements to provoke incidents, about 15-20 motorcycles. The result of this is what is recorded in the video.

During their panicked retreat and after once again suffocating the area with asphyxiating gas, they even left behind radios, according to witnesses.

The march through Exarchia moved dynamically with the participation of hundreds. Continue reading “Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: Video from the Day X protest & riots to resist the occupation of Exarcheia square by cops and the building of a metro station” →

Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: 25 June – Day of national and international support for the Exarcheia – Demonstration in Exarcheia Square 20:00

Posted on 2022/06/25 by darknights

Continue reading “Exarcheia, Athens, Greece: 25 June – Day of national and international support for the Exarcheia – Demonstration in Exarcheia Square 20:00” →

Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for the attack on the OBA store

Posted on 2022/06/24 - 2022/06/24 by darknights

On the night of May Day we chose to attack the new store in the area of Exarcheia, at 45 Themistokleous Street, called OBA. We smashed its window and left the political message of our action with stickers saying that since the opening of this shop the homeless person who lived in front of its window was displaced.

This action was our response to the displacement of the homeless man who had resided for years in the arcade in front of that store and who, after the store opened, was forced to seek shelter in another corner of the neighborhood.

How those who are left over are displaced to make way for urban and middle-class shoppers is also shown by the fact that on the opposite side from the store we raided there was a housing squat, which the state evacuated some years ago, sealing the building to prevent its reoccupation.

The tactics of capital’s domination of the public space of the city were also shown by the well-known story of the Janus bookstore that had its entrance blocked to prevent homeless people from sleeping there. The store that we attacked behind the mask of being LGBTQ-friendly consumers is participating in the transformation of the neighborhood into a hipster consumption zone, the touristization of Exarcheia and the displacement of those who are left over.

Any store that puts its stake in the gentrification of the Exarcheia will get a rock in its window.

Get the hipsters out of Exarcheia.

We want immigrants in every neighborhood, not tourists on vacation.

Get the cops out of our lives.

Anarchists

Source: athens.indymedia

Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for the incendiary attack in Pefkis-Lykovrisi – To burn the beast of gentrification to the ground by Thousands of Suns of the Night

Posted on 2022/05/27 - 2022/05/27 by darknights

On 27/04 we placed incendiary devices in the offices of the Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy) Pefkis-Lykovrisi, burning them completely outside and a large part inside, essentially closing the office.

We hold this party accountable for a series of actions that form the backbone of the Greek state’s agenda.

Redevelopment-Regeneration-Repatriation-Suppression

From the beginning of its term of office, ND as a government has shown its intentions on the issue of the city. The Athenian centre is constantly being shaped as a luxury showcase for global and European tourism. This process started and accelerated already in the years of the covid-19 boom when hundreds of thousands of euros were given for the construction of the Grand Walk (pet gentrification project of Athens mayor Kostas Bakoyannis). Public space is increasingly occupied by goods and consumers. Universities and spaces that once seemed to be meeting points for movements and collective processes are now being cleared, controlled and mapped with cameras and cops (ΟΠΠΙ, university cops). The state’s attempt to turn the Gini polytechnic into a monument in a move of gentrification is also characteristic. At the same time, student movements are subjected to extreme repression, with typical examples being the pressure in other universities such as the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, as well as the case of the 14 students who are being persecuted under the umbrella of manipulating DNA files. In continuation of the pressure on the anarchist movement with reference to meeting places is the continuous repression of the occupations in the centre of Athens and Thessaloniki.

Of course, along with all the above comes the redevelopment of squares, parks and hills. The criminal collaboration of the state with capital leads to the appearance of construction sites and dust in the squares, security barriers, blocking of work sites, extra security with security and cops and as expected: displacement of the poor, the marginalized, migrant women. Even the few places that the poor, the people from below, the people of our class had to catch their breath, are being forcibly taken away from them. This plan is being carried out all over the centre, from Galatsi and Pagrati to the most migrant neighbourhoods, Kypseli Square, Protomaya Square and soon Exarcheia Square. Continue reading “Athens, Greece: Responsibility claim for the incendiary attack in Pefkis-Lykovrisi – To burn the beast of gentrification to the ground by Thousands of Suns of the Night” →