Squatting – Page 2 – Dark Nights

The battle of Prosfygika: Striking images of squatters’ resistance during a massive police operation

Posted on 2022/11/26 by darknights

It all started in the early hours of Tuesday 22 November 2022 in Athens, Greece. In a massive operation, police special forces and squads of riot policemen invade one of the buildings of the Community of Squatted Prosfygika, break down the door of a flat and snatch two people. One of them is being accused of attacks against capitalist targets.* The operation ends and the police withdraws from the building.

Ten hours later, at about 17:00, and for no apparent reason, a massive police attack is being unleashed against two of the buildings where many people have gathered in solidarity to the community of Squatted Prosfygika, an array of 8 buildings built in the 1930s to house refugees following the “Asia Minor Disaster”.

Following the battle that ensued, scores of cops invaded the community and arrested 79 residents and people in solidarity, despite the fact that they initiated an attack with no other purpose than the attack itself, charging the arrestees with all sorts of misdemeanours for resisting their unprovoked attack. Amongst those arrested, there were even minors, a mother with her child, a pregnant woman, an accredited photo journalist and a lawyer. Many of the arrestees were badly beaten during the police invasion. Continue reading “The battle of Prosfygika: Striking images of squatters’ resistance during a massive police operation” →

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” →

Thessaloniki, Greece: Poster for the evicted squat 111

Posted on 2022/08/06 - 2022/08/14 by darknights

Poster for the evicted squat 111 that will be stuck on the streets in the coming days. Below is the text of the occupation and comrades.

In the early morning of Friday 22 July armoured forces of repression entered squat 111 and then evicted it and sealed it with an armoured door, the measures of which seem to have been taken in advance. They confiscated material and, in collaboration with the ever-willing establishment, tried to create an impression, among other things, with sharp kitchen knives and beer.

What is ultimately a squat has been an internal preoccupation from the beginning of their history. It’s the walls; it’s the relationships; it all gets complicated and changed in the course of the scythe of history. All, however, are elevated to full-light stars that point the way to the struggle for freedom and life. Simple as that. These walls, stable and immovable until recently, have housed relationships that are strong but complex and fluid in nature. The paradox of the Argo demonstrates the contradiction of this essentialist conception of the detached and self-contained/moving nature of abiotic beings by linking them to their historical position and the perception of the living beings who observe them and yet are life-giving energies for them. Placing them in dialectical relation to the surrounding world. Squats, therefore, are value-wise equally their walls equally their history, their fixed and transient world. Perhaps one of the most important roles they perform beyond the production of public discourse, interventions of all kinds and intensities, events, is the sharpening of consciences. Our squat, our big house, certainly, although it has fallen short in many ways, if it was anything, was a ‘matrix’ of well-ordered steel consciences that, through word and deed, gave and give steadily from their post in the struggle for freedom. It hosted human and non-human animals, material and archival blossoms on the tree of the struggle for the liberation of nature, land, animals and people. The eleven was neither silence nor storm. The eleven was simply a part of the larger silence before the storm we vowed would come. A page in the tomes of movement history, a thorn in the flesh, another crack in the silence of alienation. “Never say you lost something, better to say you got it back.” Not to the state dregs, nor to oblivion, but to the inevitable end of beings. This knowledge to us non-owners, the natives of cities who have always lived trying not to be trapped does not frighten us. Neither wreckage nor loss frightens us. But we are not comfortable with anything less than everything. Continue reading “Thessaloniki, Greece: Poster for the evicted squat 111” →

Leipzig, Germany: Vonovia offices attacked in solidarity with Biologico!

Posted on 2022/01/21 - 2022/01/21 by darknights

Vonovia has perfected the capitalist exploitation of the basic human need for shelter: apart from outrageously high rents, the company utilizes an endless list of inhumane practices to exploit and terrorize their renters (e.g. systematic fraud in additional costs, general refusal of maintenance, as well as extortion of drastic increases in rent via “modernisations”). Through all of this Vonovia is rapidly advancing gentrification and the housing shortage. Especially in the east of Leipzig this displacement has become increasingly obvious, in hardly any other part of the city the rent is increasing as quickly. Vonovia plays one but not the sole part in profiting massively from this development and in actively advancing it. Our actions are part of the diverse resistance against the so-called ‘valorization’ of neighbourhoods and the displacement of their residents. Militant attacks are one of many means in this fight, they are legitimate and necessary. Direct economic damage drags the ones responsible into the lime light and decreases their profits. But we must not stop there. Let’s work together in many different ways to achieve a city where living together in solidarity is prioritized over the profits of big real estate companies. Let’s create vivd and rebellious neighbourhoods and let’s find ways to connect the various fights against gentrification!

Let’s also not forget about our comrades and friends in other parts of the world. Their struggles are our struggles. The squat “Biologico” in Thessaloniki has been evicted in december of last year. This squat served as a place where social struggles were united with the fights of students and where resistance against valorization and displacement was organized. In their call to action they write: “This one week should serve as another chance for fighters, individuals and groups in Greece, Europe and the whole world to show their solidarity with the squat Biologico which has existed for 34 years and is now at risk of eviction. They should do so with any means necessary and in any way which seems useful. Each eviction has its price. Be prepared, be cautious, solidarity is our weapon.”

We hope seeing the broken windows in Vonovia’s offices brings a smile to the faces of some renters suffering under this company’s harassment.

Let’s burst the bubbles of investors’ dreams! For a city for all!

Source: de.indymedia

Thessaloniki, Greece: Arson of the construction Praxis (Πράξις) that demolished the occupation of Biologica by Cores of Immediate Action (Πυρήνες Αμεσης Δράσης)

Posted on 2022/01/08 - 2022/01/08 by darknights

On the morning of New Year’s Eve, numerous repressive forces surround the facilities of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and begin the operation to evacuate the occupation of the Biologica. They invade the hangout(at Biologica) and after the end of the research, they start the demolition works of the area. The renovation project, which concerns the “Investment in education, the acquisition of skills and lifelong learning” and amounts to a cost of 1,320,600 euros, concerns the creation of a sterile waiting area.These are the real needs of academic education: sterile spaces in a landscape deliberately degraded, to create the empty man of tomorrow, a willing servant and ruler in the appeals and interests of capitalist reconstruction.

The repressive gang war of Rector Papaioannou against the squats that belong to the(ΑΠΘ)Aristotle University of Thessaloniki continues. After the evacuation of the Terra Incognita squat in the summer of 2020, the evacuation of the squat on Nikis Street in the past (buildings that remain sealed even today), the uniformed academy proceeds to evacuate and demolish a space inside the university campus that over 3 decades captured what freedom in knowledge, self-education, access without profit and price means.The academic community officially opens its arms to militarism and repression, with the rubbish of the rectory sending its excited thanks personally to Mitsotakis himself. This is the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki:a matrix of collaborators of repression in which the officials of the uniformed Republic are hatched. Sludge like Papaioannou who does not care where he puts his signature and Margaritis who enacts laws to send to cement anyone who actually challenges the state monarchy.

In hostilities we will have the last word…

The government decides to proceed with the surprise of New Year’s Eve and to lay the veil of repression claiming the war fiesta. A few hours later, we go on the counterattack.We take responsibility for the arson attack on the building of the construction company Praxis, at 49 Kromnis Street in Kalamaria shortly before the change of the Year.Praxis is the contracting company that undertook the demolition work of the occupation. We will strike each one individually that accompanies the repression against the liberated territories and the world of struggle.

Our attack is the first reflexive action of practical solidarity in the world of struggle that defends to the end the squatters and the self-managed areas of struggle, solidarity and attack. A message of strength, support and complicity with each comrade and comrade individually who insists on denial, on questioning, on war. You will find us by your side in every moment of conflict, in every roadblock because we are not finished.We are preparing a new cycle of attacks in the war of attrition, organizing new Cores of Immediate Action. And in this war we call on every struggling initiative to take action, sharpening the confrontation quantitatively, qualitatively and operationally.

We respond to war with war.

Terra Incognita/Hangout in Biologica-squats forever

Cores of Immediate Action*

Casus Belli Core

Source: athens.indymedia

Translated by Hors

*Dark Nights would like to note that ‘Πυρήνες Αμεσης Δράσης’ has been previously translated as Direct Action Cells or Cells of Direct Action.

Thessaloniki, Greece: Evicition of Biologica Squat and Call for Solidarity Week 10-17 January

Posted on 2022/01/08 - 2022/01/08 by darknights

The state, cops and university lackies decided on 31/12/2021 to realize an eviction that has already been announced the previous months. After unofficial threats for an upcoming eviction of the Biologica squat during the previous years, in September a project agreement was signed and assigned to a contractor, with the aim of “remodeling” and “utilizing” the spaces on the ground floor of the Biology building were the squat used to be. In the plans, of course, they included the squatted area with the intention of demolishing the surrounding walls and turning it into a secretariat room and a waiting room. In New Year’s Eve as in the long gone 1992 – at that time they build the door of the squat – the university campus is surrounded by police forces while underground cops are moving towards the area of the squat. They invade our liberated ground and after conducting a thorough search, while destroying anything that was in the squat, they take pictures of their “grand” findings and they give the space to the workers to finish off the first stage of their plan, the demolition of the walls. After their intervention all of the ground floor appears to be vandalized. We never doubted the pure hate of the state, cops and university lackies towards liberated spaces.

Thessaloniki’s assembly of the Solidarity Fund for Imprisoned, Persecuted Revolutionaries found a home between these walls in 2016. During all these years the squat has been the starting point of struggles and solidarity actions for imprisoned and persecuted companions, both from the structure of the Solidarity Fund and from other groups and individuals with a central idea to resist the state and capitalist barbarism and stench and defend the prisoners of this war. Political and cultural events, book presentations and self-organized bookstores, screenings, collective kitchens and workshops, local and panhellenic assemblies, bars and concerts for the financial support of political prisoners or to cover court expenses … A few words cannot describe the political bonds, trust and companionship that developed within these walls that we found demolished. This demolition cannot destroy them, as they are our way of life and memories which are reflected in our every thought and action.

The act of eviction itself works for us as a reminder of a war that we never actually forgot was raging. Targeting comrades, persecutions, arrests and tortures, repression in all the ways possible and whatever cost as well as control with upgraded means are some parts of the rotten society in which we live, yet we have consciously chosen to continue to resist and fight side by side. Squats are the starting points of this war and as it seems they do whatever they can to leave us without structures to prepare our counterattack.

State, rectors and academics, cops and other pieces of trash that state their relief after the eviction of squats, praise the success of the law-abiding state and the successful protection of the blessed trinity of law, order and security have apparently failed to mention the above correlations with the attack on the social base, which at the level of higher education was done through the abolition of asylum, and recently through the passage of the new anti-education bill (n.4777), sealing the depoliticization and demise of the university and the devaluation of student and non-student lives.
As long as we keep on fighting, we are not defeated… we create lawless reference points, relationships build on trust and solidarity structures. We have long chose a side in this war.

PS. Papaioannou you have no reason to thank the government and sleep peacefully.

PS2. Solidarity means attack.

WE DEFEND OUR SQUATS
WE CLAIM OUR LIVES

BIOLOGICA AND THOUSAND MORE SQUATS
AGAINST A WORLD OF ORGANIZED RECEPTION
FOR SOLIDARITY, SELF-ORGANIZATION AND ANARCHY

Solidarity Fund for Imprisoned and Persecuted Revolutionaries

Grenoble, France: Revenge against the eviction machine, the racist city hall and its collabos

Posted on 2021/12/20 by darknights

In response to the eviction of the Alliance Park camp and the closure of the camp site on rue des alliés, during the night of the 16th to the 17th, an Eiffage car was hit in its windscreen and a car-sharing Citiz car was set on fire.

At the alliance park, the city hall, the prefecture and their shitty cops did not hesitate to put dozens of people on the street and in even more precarious situations, destroying their tents with their belongings and papers inside. While it is less than 0 degrees every night.
It’s not a few poor nights in a hotel for the people that will redeem your image, you bunch of idiots.
The policy of not welcoming exiles in France and in Europe is tightening more and more.
How many more people will die?

Eiffage is helping to build CRAs, Citiz is helping Grenoble to become so smart city.
The greens are playing it green and progressive but they are just as filthy as the others.
Firing the undesirables, attracting investors and good French people, increasing control via smartphones with cars, scooters, car-sharing bikes. What a project.

Material and emotional solidarity with the exiles is important, but so is the offensive against the oppressors.

This communique is a call to put pressure on City Hall and its allies by attacking the equipment and the people who make this beautiful system work.

Source: Attaque

Athens, Greece: Call for participation in the defense of the Squatted Community of Prosfygika on Alexandras Avenue (EN, TUR, ES, IT, DE, FR)

Posted on 2021/12/20 - 2022/01/30 by darknights

Hello comrades,

We address this call to collectives and individuals from all around the world to join the combative defense of PROSFYGIKA against the imminent repression. The attempted evacuation of our neighborhood must be turned into a central event of resistance and a victory against political power and the gentrification of our neighborhoods in the metropolis.

Call in turkish.pdf
Call in espanol.pdf
Call in italiano.pdf
Call auf deutsch.pdf
Call in francaise.pdf

WHAT WE INVITE YOU TO DEFEND:

The building complex of Prosfygika was built in 1933 for the refugees coming from Asia minor.

In the conditions of the time, a vibrant working class neighbourhood with communal characteristics emerged. Today,it is one of the biggest building complexes in the center of Athens, which is still not gentrified and exploited by big investors or the state. It is a place of strategic significance, since it is located between the two ‘pillars’ of authority – the Supreme Court on one hand and the Police Headquarters on the other.

Within this socio-spatial frame, some militants, who were already living in the neighborhood as squatters, decided to organize. In 2010 they initiated the Community of Squatted Prosfygika, having as its central decision-making political organ the Assembly of Squatted Prosfygika (SY.KA.PRO.). A communal body for everyday life and political struggle. Continue reading “Athens, Greece: Call for participation in the defense of the Squatted Community of Prosfygika on Alexandras Avenue (EN, TUR, ES, IT, DE, FR)” →

Freiburg, Germany: Revenge for the G19 eviction

Posted on 2021/12/07 by darknights

Two days after the G19 was evicted we went out at night to express our anger. It hit the headquarters of the Freiburg Stadtbau in Stühlinger, which now has a few panes less and looks nice and colorful from the outside.

Even if masses of cops secured the eviction in Freiburg, they can’t be everywhere every night. We’re pissed at a Green City that’s flattening free spaces, but the city also has a lot to offer in terms of night time excursions with real estate offices, banks and cop guards, so it’s up to us to make sure they won’t sleep well!

You can take our rooms, but you won’t get rid of us!
Attack the city of the rich!
G19 lives!

Source: de.indymedia

Berlin, Germany: Attacking gentrification – DEFEND KØPI

Posted on 2021/10/12 by darknights

Attacking gentrification – DEFEND KØPI

On Sunday night we visited the Google office on the corner of Adelbert and Engeldamm and smashed its windows. Only a stone’s throw from Køpiplatz, it is, as a stakeholder in gentrification, co-responsible for the upcoming eviction attempt.

Solidarity greetings to all people who will defend the Køpi with us on 15.10!

Source: de.indymedia