2006-10-02
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- Interventionist Left's G8 website now in English
- Ausschreibungen - Sicherheitszaun (06E0370)
- Summit Hoppin' 06
- Autonomous rear Entrances to Fortress Europe?!
- Keine Macht für G8 - Kampagne der Neuen Linken
- Apel la rezistenta impotriva G8
- Stop the G8+5, Defend Oaxaca! Virtual Action - Tuesday / Wednesday October 3-4, 2006!
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Interventionist Left's G8 website now in English
The Interventionist Left's G8 website is now in English online. Check out: www.g8-2007.de
[www.g8-2007.de]
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Ausschreibungen Sicherheitszaun (06E0370)
Auftragsbeschreibung
Der Betrieb für Bau und Liegenschaften Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Geschäftsbereich Rostock beabsichtigt, oben genannte Leistung zu vergeben.
Interessenten finden nähere Informationen zu dieser Ausschreibung in der folgenden PDF-Datei: Vergabebekanntmachung
PLZ 18209
Erfüllungsort Heiligendamm
CPV-Code 45342000-45223822
[http://www.bund.de/nn_176712/Organisations/Bund/U/MV/U/FM/U/BBL-MV/U/BBL-MV-Rostock/Daten/Ausschreibungen/060929-06E0370-Sicherheitszaun-ausschr.html]
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Summit Hoppin' 06
Eight years after the first big summit blockades, activists are still mobilized against. On several different occasions this summer there were demonstrations and discussions about political approaches and the planning of actions. For example at the G8 summit in St. Petersburg, the Campinski near Heiligendamm, and the PGA conference in France.
St. Petersburg - and what`s next?
The meeting of the representatives of eight of the most powerful industrial states this year in St. Petersburg was once again joined by protests. Despite the fact that the preparations had been constricted by the Russian authorities, some succesful actions still took place.
A spontanous pink and silver demonstration playing samba paraded through a major shopping street in Moskau, and in a separate action, the St. Petersburg hotel where some summit participants were staying was symbolically blockaded.
It showed that even under such difficult conditions protests are possible.
Despite the small participation of people from western europe the networking beetween easten and western Europe was one of the most positive aspects of the protests. To strengthen these contacts, a NoBorder Camp has been planned for August 2007. The camp will take place in the Ukraine, where conditions are expected to be less restrictive. First of all the entry for people from East- and West Europe is easier and previous actions were confronted with little repression and received adequate media coverage. There will be an international preparation meeting in winter to organize this camp on an international level and support the local scene.
Campinski - the calm before the storm on the summit (die Ruhe vor dem Gipfelsturm)
Immediately after the G8 summit in St. Petersburg, over 1000 G8 opposers discussed and continued preparing the protests against the G8 summit in Heiligendamm next year in Germany. "The idea of the camp was primarily to coordinate the resistance and create next year's protest together," explained Rosa Camper in a concluding statement.
In addition to the 2007 preparations, there were over 150 workshops. For example, video activists guided participants on the use of cameras, an international working group was founded, the infotour held Do Infotour-Yourself workshops, and the connections between the G8 and agriculture and migration issues were discussed.
Aside from making plans, selforganisation was put to the test. As someone from indymedia remarked: "A lot of things did not work well, but that means we have a checklist for next year." But generally speaking selforganization already worked quite well. This was also visible on Sunday when almost everything had been cleaned up really fast with lots of helping hands.
Although people had to be reminded from time to time to translate, participants tried to put into practice the ideals of international mobilization, which means not only to invite activists from many countries, but togive them the possibility to get involved with the organisation. The fact that this is not such an easy task can be seen from the fact that there are still two email lists, one in German and one international.
Another focus of the camp were direct actions. In Bad Doberan numerous community members were informed about the upcoming summit and its local reference by a Door-knocking-action. Later on, around 300 participants of the Campinski and NoLager-activists demonstrated in Rostock against exclusion of refugees and for "Same rights for everyone".
Around 80 participants visited a field planted with GMOs near Rostock. Another group demonstrated against the German Neo-Nazi party, and in addition an exhibit of sculptures of Arno Breker, Hitlers favourite sculpturer was symbolically closed down.
Another symbolic action which was a lot of fun was the swimming day in front of the Kempinski Hotel, site - location of next years summit. Approx. 400 people walked on the beach, accompanied by a samba band and the Rebel Clowns Armee. During the manifestation some people dropped banners out of an empty villa at the beach, calling attention to the threat of the beach privatisation. All in all the Campinski was another success and bodes well for the protests next year
PGA Conference - Networking struggles since 1998
Discussion about the G8 summit was not limited to Campinski, but also took place at the European PGA (Peoples GlobalAction) conference, a gathering at five separate locations across France.
The feeling that the global days of actions (GDA), first initiated by PGA, are not working as they should was raised several times. On the first Action Days initiated by PGA there had been big demonstrations and actions as well in the global south as in the north. But in the last years they lacking substance.
For that reason some groups have turned their attention to selforganization in squats and communes. This approach played an important role on the conference that was mainly organized by groups like the Sans Titre Network, which is focusing on such approaches.Nevertheless, the anti-summit mobilisation was also discussed as an opportunity to connect local struggles to their global context.
How to get of the activist ghetto was an important issue of discussion that became apparent in several approaches and projects.
Some of the conference participants searched for possibilities to connect the resistence against the G8 with other social struggles.
Along thematic lines like migration, agriculture, anti-militarism or within the context of topics like energy, nuclear power, oil and war, different local struggles could be brought together.
The idea of 'Theme Days' to preceed the G8 summit, where global connections in different contexts could be discussed, came up at Campinski and was echoed in France.
By bringing people together on the basis of specific but global social concerns, the hope is that far-reaching ideas will be developed, and that these ideas will remain relevant long after the end of the summit.
One example is the working group G8 and aggriculture, which calls for worldwide actions against the agrobusiness:
"Hopefully, a broad coalition of farmers, consumers, trade unionists and opponents to economic globalisation will take action against the global agri-business, gaining publicity around the G8 Summit in spring 2007. The objective is to carry out actions at various points within the agricultural production chain. For example: to blockade the sowing of genetically modified crops; to address the outrageous working conditions of employees and the ruinous prices paid by the head buyers at the multinational supermarket, Lidl; to criticise the agricultural policies of the European Union and the collaboration between different departments at the University of Rostock and agri-business in front of a pig-fattening factory. With a diversity of actions, it should be possible to show who are the winners and losers in globalised agriculture."
Besides this campaign there are already groups like the "BUKO Kampagne gegen Biopiraterie" who think about the connection beetween the G8 summit and the COP9 (conference of the Parties, a gremium of the convention on biological diversity) which will take place 2008 in Germany.
Another approach to the focus on the time before and after the summit is the Karawahnsinn/Caravan Utopia through europe with the motto " Movin Europe". The vision, which is presented on the webpage: vision07.org, is to have many different caravans connecting many different people or groups. The caravans would come together at 'stations' which would be autonomous spaces, social centres etc that have the ability to host people. These stations would be a place to share experiences, find out what the different caravans have been doing, what links have been made, have workshops and discuss practical steps to move forward. The caravan will also try to share culture and develop art & creativity as we use culture to shape our politics and politics to shape our lives. But also to start a dialogue with local groups and local struggles outside of our usual activist structures.
In the meantime there had been a lot more diskussions and meeting and this was only an overview of some of the many events. In the next few months the mobilization will continue. In addition to some meetings on specific toppics or projects (see www.gipfelsoli.org) there are two general meetings:
27. - 29. Oktober: dissent!-Treffen, Osnabrück
10. - 12. November: 2. Aktionskonferenz, Rostock
[Graswurzelrevolution]
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Autonomous rear Entrances to Fortress Europe?!
Antiracist Perspectives in regard to G-8 Summit 2007
For years there has been a deep divide in the (antiracist) Left when the issue of flight and migration comes up. While one side is talking about "Fortress Europe" and mainly concentrates on attacking the ever more sophisticated regime of borders, camps and deportations, the other side favors the concept of "autonomy of migration" as the archimedial reference point. According to this concept one should not fortget that despite all efforts to close the borders each year hundreds of thousand people enter the European Union on an irregular basis who organize their survival under self-determined, however rather precarious conditions. Migration therefore should be deciphered as "social protagonism", i.e. resilience; it could even be termed the "most successful social movement".
It is relevant to find answers to the questions and problems that arise from both positions - not only for principal reasons, but also in regard to the politics of the movement. Current background is the G-8 Summit in Heiligendamm (North-Eastern Germany) in 2007. A variety of groups and networks are of the opinion that "migration" should become one of the central issues of the anti-G8-summit resistance. But the perspective from which this should happen is open. Additionally, other groups that are also taking part in the mobilization, are keeping rather quiet when it comes to the issue of migration. The most prominent example is attac. Therefore one should emphasize that the issue of migration is at the center of a large number of struggles for global (civil, political and social) rights. In other words: It would be rather shameful, if one didn't take the opportunity to systematically examine the interdependencies - also in regard to the cooperation of the different segments of the protest movement that everyone is talking about and aiming at.
To talk about Fortress Europe is aiming at three developments at the core: First of all, that fewer and fewer people manage to come as asylum seekers to Europe. Second, that in most countries of the European Union it is almost impossible to be granted political asylum. Third, that between 30.000 and 50.000 people are being deported each year from Germany alone. This number doesn't even take into account those 70.000 people who - in the language of the bureaucrats - "voluntarily" leave Germany; most of them solely in order to escape their enforced deportation. This increased escalation of a dynamic of repression has been enabled by a large number of legal, administrative and institutional tightening measures or new developments since the early 1990ies. Therefore it is rather fitting that the European Union has incorporated the concept of so-called "safe third countries" which originates from the repressive German asylum policy into its recently ratified regulations for asylum procedures. According to this concept, refugees who enter the E.U. via a so-called "safe third country" cannot invoke the right to asylum. In the future, even countries that haven't ratified the Geneva Refugee Convention such as Libya, Mauritania or the Ukraine are going to be classified as "safe third countries" for the European Union. One of the immediate consequences would be that Italy's practice for some time to illegally deport boat-people refugees to Libya could soon be legalized under these new regulations. On top of that the plan is to immediately and directly send back all refugees and migrants who are apprehended at the outer frontiers of the European Union - this is the context in which the so-called reception camps or rather deportation camps that have been built with the support of the European Union in Libya, Mauritania or the Ukraine are operating (the key word is outsourcing of the protection for refugees). One also has to mention that for more than one-and-a-half decade now a massive neo-liberal propaganda campaign has been going on which has been proclaiming the end of the fordistic social-welfare state model and has massively incited the willingness of large segments of society to exclude certain segments of the population for racist reasons. As a result you can not only see the so-called "nationally liberated zones" in Eastern Germany, but also the never-ending integration debate on headscarves, school yards in Berlin or pseudo-homo-friendly citizenship tests.
In contrast to this point of the view, the protagonists of the autonomy of migration are drawing a much brighter, even opulent picture. For example, they claim the allegation that today less refugees and migrants are coming to Europe is simply not true. To the contrary, from their point of view it is however correct that the technologies of migration control that are detailed in the Fortress-Europe discourse have changed the conditions for migration. Concretely: A "change in the form of migration" has occurred (Transit Migration (1)). People don't even start the hardship of a rather senseless asylum procedure with no hope for a success (if they have the opportunity at all to file a claim for asylum), but they still come to Europe. They come as undocumented migrants, hundreds of thousands, and mostly for the same reasons than before. This circumstance points to the core of the autonomy of migration: "that migration entails a moment of independency from political measures which aims at control" (Transit Migration). Background is that refuges and migrants are not coming by themselves but with the help of community networks. "They are being supported by a movement which owns knowledge, which follows its own rules and organizes its practice collectively." (Yann Moulier Boutang (2) ). The fact that refugees manage to "circumvent, to escape and to disable migration" controls (Transit Migration) does not only have something to do with autonomy of migration itself. According to this line of argumentation it is equally important that the aim of modern migration policy is not complete sealing-off as the Fortress Europe discourse claims. The aim is rather to "produce an active process of inclusion of migrant labour through their clandestinization" on the basis of labour-market oriented policy and calculations of requirements. (Sandro Mezzadra (3)). Accordingly, the qualitative position of refugees and migrants is more important at the border than the quantity of migration. Because it is only their (hierarchically organized) disfranchisement which turns them into labour nomads who are flexible, available and more or less easy victims of blackmail. And still: Even if the residency status, the employment and the living conditions are very precarious, one issue shouldn't be forgotten from the point of view of autonomy of migration. If one talks about the struggles of migrants, one talks about the daily strategies of survival of refugees and migrants which the state has a hard time to control. These struggles very often don't express themselves politically (which often wouldn't be so easy anyway), but they are a continuous challenge to the status quo; their mere factual existence continuously changes the European societies - whether these societies like it or not.
Even if the presentation is only tentative, we can already determine that the concept of autonomy of migrations is in many aspects a valuable amendment or rather relativization of the Fortress Europe discourse. First of all, it breaks through the rather narrow focus on refugee policies and widely opens up a political or antiracist space. Secondly, it comes together with the building of bridges into the field of (precarious) labour, which can hardly be overestimated politically: i.e. communication of movements. And thirdly, it openly rejects any form of victimization. Even though to degrade refugees and migrants hardly constitutes a standing factor within the Fortress Europe discourse, it still happens regularly that both in the left as well as in the bourgeois-liberal understanding of the metaphor of Fortress Europe refugees and migrants hardly turn up as active subjects - because the moment of fencing-off is being placed at the center and often comes in an apocalyptic rethorical fashion.
However, the autonomy of migration is not unerring. It also contains gaps and points of radical one-sidedness and it is being characterized rather often - despite all denials - by a verbal glorification of migrant struggles. Or rather, statements from this side are often understood in that sense.
1 The thesis that migration controls could not stop the paths of refugees and migrants, but could only "prolong or reroute them" (Transit Migration) is rather absurd - at least, if you take it literally. To argue in such a manner tears apart connected issues and turns a blind eye to central facts. First of all, that each year more than 500.000 people are being deported from the European Union or are being sent back (in addition to those who "voluntarily" leave the E.U.). Secondly, that each year tens of thousands of people - and possibly more - do not manage to even get to Europe. Let's remember the Kosovo War in 1999, when about 550.000 of 800.000 refugees from Kosovo were directly directed to temporary and strictly guarded refugee camps in Albania and Macedonia and thereby prevented from continuing their journey to the European Union (i.e: Regional Protection Areas). Thirdly, that regularly people are dying on their way to the European Union. Since the beginning of this year alone it is said that up to 4.000 people drowned in the sea around the Canary Islands - due to the increased surveillance of the Mediterranean Sea. Fourthly, that flight and migration not only become more expensive because of migration policy measures, but also the risks are higher. The consequences are that more and more people are being deterred and don't even dare to leave (while at the same time the numbers of those who would be willing to migrate is increasing on a permanent basis). Take for example numerous reports and studies from countries such as Algeria, Morocco or Nigeria, where large segments of the unemployed youths seem to be nearly obsessed by the idea to search for their luck in Europe or the United States. However, when it comes down to it, only relatively few dare to take the leap.
This means concretely, that it is misleading to determine migration policy as a defensive (sic) reaction of the state which primarily aims at illegalizing refugees and migrants (and thereby leave them helpless to overexploitation). So to speak as a compensation for the fact that migration policy is unable to regulate the entrances to Europe more effectively. It might be true that despite all shows of power of European politicians the movements of migrations are characterized by an adorable momentum. And it is also true that the neo-liberal European Union is interested for a number of reasons in (undocumented) cheap labour from the peripheries. In this setting the thesis gains it specific plausibility that currently a migration regime is developing (in Southeastern Europe) "which institutionalizes the transit and a precarious immigration with its informal economies" (Transit Migration). But it is equally true that the larger segment of the migrants is not wanted for reasons of political order and for financial reasons - this is especially true for refugees. Therefore migration policy as a whole always aims at both: On the one hand, illegalization, and on the other hand fencing-off - a double-function which is best being described with the term "filter".
2. Proponents of the autonomy of migration take a critical stance towards political disputes with structural backgrounds of flight and migration - for example, in the way the slogan of the Caravan puts it: "We are here because you are destroying our countries." Such a focus would lead to the danger to degrade people as match-balls under objective conditions of coercion; by arguing in such a manner one would play into the hands of the humanitarian discourse, which would only recognize and accept refugees and migrants as helpless victims but not as social actors who are self-confidently demanding or taking their rights. This criticism is indeed very important, but one should be careful not to erect Potemkian villages. Because voluntarism vs. determination or subjectivism vs. objectivism are incorrect antagonisms and therefore they are not appropriate to describe the complex, sometimes contradictory dynamic of flight and migration in its complexity. In the concrete debate, this is something one can easily agree on - even by quoting Karl Marx: "The people are making their own history, but they don't make it out of free will, not under conditions which they have chosen themselves, but under conditions that they stumble upon, that are given and that are bequeathed to them."
Politically, there are many reasons to put the concrete situation in the refugees' and migrants' countries of origin on the antiracist agenda. Flight and migration are deeply embedded into the global relations between periphery and center. One example, that can be mentioned here, are the dramatic destruction processes of small farmers' existences that have been taking place since the early 1980ies and have been spurred on especially by the IMF, WTO, multinationals and the agrarian policies of the European Union and the United States. As a consequence of these processes massive flight and migration movements have been set into motion not only in Central America, but also in many countries of the Sub-Sahara and in Asia (4). To create bridges between the demands that derive from this situation - such as the "Right to Sovereignty of Nourishment" - and demands that are linked to migration - such as "For free movement globally" -, would bring social movements together which normally don't have much in common and they would empower each other. Secondly, in that manner it would become more obvious than before that migration poses fundamental questions of global justice (in dissemination). That would bring about the demand to reject any solutions and strategies that promote euro-protectionism for principal reasons. On the one hand, because such options cannot be legitimized politically and ethically - the key word here is: Global Rights. On the other hand, because social disorders which are also becoming more common in Europe as a consequence of capitalist globalization cannot be cushioned in the short or in the long term by stripping refugees and (undocumented) migrants of their rights and by structurally placing them in wage and other competitions with E.U. citizens.
3. From the point of view of autonomy of migration collectively organized flight and migration movements would belong to the most successful social movements. The reasoning for this line of argumentation is that refugees and migrants manage to temporarily or continuously set foot in the rich industrialized countries - whether stabilizing their status step-by-step, or by marriage or via family reunions, undocumented residency or mass legalizations by the authorities. Even Germany has unwillingly become a de facto immigration country in the past 50 years in that manner - with cities such as Frankfurt, Munich or Stuttgart where more than 20 % of the population have a migration background. In other words, this line of argumentation which needs time to get used it functions on the premise that the term of "social movements" should not be narrowly defined for political reasons, but it should be amended with the dimension of daily, subtle and rather quiet acts of resistance. A concrete result should be to also understand the day-to-day struggles of migrants as political acts of resistance. That means as attempts to break the borders of citizenship, to appropriate new spaces of freedom and equality, to build transnational spaces, to demand or to take the right to mobility and others (compare: Frassanito Network 2006). Most of the time Toni Negri and Michael Hardt are called upon as godfathers of these theses. In their book "Empire" they are conceptualizing "desertion, exodus and nomadism" as contemporary "basic forms of resistance", even as a "powerful form of class struggle".
But still: There are a lot of reasons to not just easily merge political and daily acts of resistance. Because it is not an automatic step from individual strategies of survival - even if they might be organized in networks - to collectively structured processes of emancipatory social changes. Or more drastically: Someone who crosses borders in an undocumented fashion and there by de facto undermines the border regime is not necessarily a fighter for global free movement (and doesn't have to be one, either). Massive nomadism might be the central source which feeds the idea of global free movement, however this construction which has been formed in a political and theoretical fashion should not at all be ascribed to and projected onto refugees and migrants as a "conviction via position". Rather, the idea of global free movement is probably going to develop its impact solely under the condition that its political intention experiences a massive and collective appropriation - either by refugees and migrants themselves or by third parties. When the political and daily acts of resistance are interfering with each other or amalgamating in the context of joint social movement practices and thereby create each other's resonating spaces (without become indistinguishable), then the prerequisites have been created for substantial changes in the larger power balance of society. There are some examples for the above mentioned: The sans-papiers in France who managed such a synthesis of different forms of resistance and thereby turned the political status quo upside down. Etienne Balibar points to that example in his model works on "incomplete citizenships", talking about a citizenship concept which is not based on nationality or status, but on activity: "In a paradox sense, the struggles of the sans papiers (...) are outstanding moments in the developments of an active citizenship (or, if you want, in the direct participation in public affairs) without which no community of citizens could exist, but only a formal of state cut off from society and choking on its own abstraction." (5)
It is this background which at the latest should make it clear where the shortcomings are if migration is being ennobled without hesitation as the most successful social movement - as it happens frequently in the discourse of autonomy of migration. It threatens to inflate strategies of survival and day-to-day acts of resistance. And it threatens to diminish the politically utopian horizon rather quickly to shifts within the existing status quo. Also, the danger exists that contradictions are being put onto the backburner (of the discourse) and in that manner - sort of in a form of a self-fulfilling prophecy spin - to lend additional credibility of the "success" theory. We are talking here - beyond what has already been mentioned - about the horrible working conditions in the precarious low-wage sectors which sometimes resemble the conditions of the Manchester era; or the fact that rich industrialized countries have been dependent on low-wage workers for a long time and therefore it is questionable to label (undocumented) migrant labour as a subversive act of appropriation. Even the much quoted money transfers of work migrants to their families go ahnd-in-glove with effects that stabilize the system. Because in many countries, for example El Salvador, the state encourages money transfers as a highly welcome compensation for the income deficits which the people are confronted with due to neo-liberal policies.
It should be obvious that the debate is not over here. One possibility to continue could be the already started mobilization against G8 - possibly even in regard to the mass action for "global free movement" and "equal rights" shortly before the start of the summit which has been proposed by a number of groups. (compare: www.nolager.de)
(1) Andrijasevic, R., Bojadzijev, M., Hess, S., Karakayali, S., Panagiotidis, E., Tsianos, V.: Turbulent Fringes. Contours of a new migration regime in South Eastern Europe (Turbulente Ränder. Konturen eines neuen Migrationsregimes im Südosten Europas). In: PROKLA 140 (Migration), 345-362
(2) Boutang, Yann Moulier: No longer a reserve army. Thoughts on autonomy of migration and the necessary end of the regime of work migration (Nicht länger Reservearmee. Thesen zur Autonomie der Migration und zum notwendigen Ende des Regimes der Arbeitsmigration.) In: Suptropen 12/2004
(3) quoted from Karakayali, Serhat, Tsianos, Vassilis: Mapping the Order of New Migration. Undocumented labour and autonomy of migration (Undokumentierte Arbeit und die Autonomie der Migration.) In: PERIPHERIE 97/98 (Weltmarkt für Arbeitskräfte), 35-64
(4) compare Gregor Samsa: About the necessity of a rediscovery. Global farming and the power of capitalist agro-industry. (Über die Notwendigkeit einer Wiederentdeckung. Globale Landwirtschaft und die Macht kapitalistischer Agrarindustrie.) In: ak - analyse & kritik - Zeitung für linke Debatte und Praxis / Nr. 506 / 19.5.2006
(5) Balibar, Étienne, Are we citizens of Europe? (Sind wir Bürger Europas?), Bonn 2005
[Gregor Samsa (NoLager Bremen)]
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Keine Macht für G8 - Kampagne der Neuen Linken
Am 22. und 23.9. hat in Berlin das erste G8-Kampagnentreffen von Linkspartei, WASG, solid und Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung stattgefunden.
29 Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmer aus 10 Bundesländern, der AG Betrieb und Gewerkschaften, dem Hochschulgruppen-Netzwerk und aus der Bundestagsfraktion waren dabei und haben eine Mobilisierungs- und Informationskampagne für die gemeinsame Linke geplant.
Erste Flugblätter stehen zum 21.10. zur Verfügung, dann steht zunächst die interne Information über G8 auf der Tagesordnung. Januar 2007 ist der offizielle Kampagnenstart. Das nächste Treffen findet am 1. und 2. Dezember statt.
Dokumentation des Kampagnenworkshops
Eine gute Kampagne braucht ein gutes Logo.
Für die G8-Kampagne bitten wir alle kreativen Köpfe, sich an der Ausschreibung für das Kampagnenlogo zu beteiligen.
Bündnistermin
10.-12. November: Internationale Aktionskonferenz zur Vorbereitung der Proteste
Informationen und Nachfragen: christine.buchholz@web.de, lars.kleba@linkspartei.de
[christine.buchholz@web.de]
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Apel la rezistenta impotriva G8
Multe anunturi ca acesta au fost facute inainte de acesta pentru ca oamenii sa-si exprime protestul impotriva unui sistem international nejust, incorect si inegal. Summitul G8 reprezinta doar o parte din acesta. Multi s-au exprimat pentru mobilizari si au sperat ca reteaua o sa creasca de la sine, in acelasi timp nefiind siguri daca avem sau nu �reteta' exacta. Vom incerca sa nu repetam greseli din trecut. Noi, grupul international de lucru al rezistentei impotriva urmatorului G8, suntem doar oameni ce stam pe �camp', dorind sa schimbam lumea.
Chemam oamenii din toata lumea sa ni se alature in procesul de dezvoltare a unei rezistente puternice si efective, aici si acum, impotriva summitului G8 din Heiligendamm 2007 si in viitor, impotriva intregului circ sangeros capitalist.
Uitandu-ne dincolo de aceasta mobilizare, vom construi o structura puternica a unei rezistente globale continue, nascuta prin intermediul diversitatii noastre. Ne dorim crearea unor retele durabile care sa imprastie si sa extinda discutii si idei dincolo de granite.
Pentru a face rezistenta impotriva G8 efectiva pe cat posibil dorim sa facilitam participarea oamenilor de pe intreg globul in pregatirea, exprimarea experientelor si in actiunea propriu zisa, in interiorul sau exteriorul Germaniei.
Practic asta inseamna cateva lucruri :
Vom publica un newsletter - in primul rand pentru a furniza stiri relevante si informatii despre pregatirea si discutiile din Germania si din exterior. La acest nivel va exista un site in limba engleza si un mailinglist pentru comunicarea dintre grupul organizatoric si activisti, punand baza unei retele internationale inaintea summitului.
Pentru a atinge aceste obiective va rugam sa contribuiti cu informatii, experiente, tematici, forme de actiune, puncte de vedere si idei pentru o rezistenta practica. In acelasi timp avem nevoie de ajutor, legat de traduceri si distribuirea informatiilor pentru a face informatia accesibila oricui si avem nevoie de ajutorul voluntarilor pentru a tipari si distribui newsletter-ul in comunitatile locale.
Ii invitam pe toti cei interesati sa se implice si in grupul organizatoric, in special va invitam sa participati la intalnirea internationala care va avea loc in primul sau al doilea weekend in februarie.
Locatia intalnirii n-a fost inca selectata dar va fi in afara Germaniei, cu scopul de a reprezenta un spatiu usor de atins pentru ca toti dintre noi sa participe. Pentru ca lumea sa se poata prezenta la intalnirea pregatitoare dar si la protestele din Germania, vom oferi informatii actualizate, informatii practice pentru obtinerea vizei si transport si daca va fi posibil, suport financiar pentru obtinerea vizei.
Acesta si multe alte proiecte ale grupului organizatoric necesita fonduri si speram ca acolo unde exista posibilitati, sa se poata organiza strangeri de fonduri.
Vom ajuta in a face acest proces si actiunile pe cat posibil deschise, coordonand si furnizand informatii clare si relevante, in acelasi timp, cai de comunicare usor accesibile.
Vrem schimbare - nu doar pentru copiii nostri, dar si pentru noi.
Ne adresam tie pentru a te alatura noua si pentru a face din aceasta mobilizare o noua piatra, un alt cui in sicriul capitalismului international.
[g8-int]
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Stop the G8+5, Defend Oaxaca! Virtual Action -
Tuesday / Wednesday October 3-4, 2006!
The Borderlands Hacklab, Electronic Disturbance Theater and Rising Tide North America call for a virtual sit-in against the websites of the G8+5 and the Mexican government during the G8+5 meetings on October 3-4th, 2006 in Mexico.
To join the virtual action, click here: http://sdhacklab.org/oaxaca
As the Mexican government tries to play host to the G8+5 Gleneagles Dialogue on Climate Change, it is mounting a massive violent attack on the people of Oaxaca. Apparently the Mexican government thinks it can cleanse the country of its growing pro-democracy rebellion while laying out a red carpet to world politicians including the G8 Energy Ministers. The neoliberal project of corporate globalization and fossil-fuel-based "energy security" that causes global warming is built on massive violence, from armies to riot police to militarized borders, to turn the global south into its sweatshop and repress the uprisings for justice, democracy, and sustainable livelihood of the people in Mexico and other countries.
While the neoliberal model of industrial "development" sees the remaining indigenous and "undeveloped" lands of the Earth as territories for capitalist exploitation of natural resources and human labor, the schoolteachers leading Oaxaca's popular pro-democracy strike have a different vision. By taking direct action to shut down the tyrannical rule of their state governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, the people of Oaxaca are teaching that another world is possible.
On Sunday, October 1, 2006, a headline in the Mexico City daily Milenio proclaimed, "Preparations for war in Oaxaca," while Mexico City's El Universal newspaper reported that helicopters, planes and 15 troop trucks had assembled in Huatulco, a Pacific tourist getaway and military hub a short flight â but a long and difficult drive â from Oaxaca city. According to the independent news website Narconews.com, which has been covering the Other Campaign of the Zapatistas, on Sunday, October1, 2006:
"The Mexican Navy carried out a reconnaissance operation over the buildings and public spaces occupied by the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO in its Spanish initials). Two MI-17 helicopters and one CASA C212 Navy airplane with registration number AMP-118 flew over the streets of the city â where opponents of Governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz have maintained several encampments over the past 130 days â for about 40 minutes."
"The zocalo, or central city square, the Oro and La Ley radio stations, the state government building, the Brenamiel and El Rosario radio antennas, as well as the Department of Finance building â all places where the rebels have installed protest camps â were reconnoitered by low-level flights of military aircraft. As they passed over the Radio Oro facilities, the two helicopters were fruitlessly "attacked" with fireworks that teachers of the National Education Workers' Union local Section 22 launched from Conzatti Garden. The airplane then made four more passes over the areas around the zocalo and returned to the airport, where five other military aircraft were stationed. At 5:30 that afternoon, the naval surveillance plane and two AMHT-202 and AMHT-205 helicopters landed on a city airstrip and let out 18 soldiers in black-and-grey camouflage, bulletproof vests, helmets and firearms.
"Lino Celaya Lur�a, state secretary of Citizen Protection, confirmed that the objective of the military flights was to "reconnoiter" the scene of the conflict, but claimed not to know if this was the prelude to an eventual federal operation to remove the protesters. The state official limited himself to saying: "We were informed that a flight would occur over the areas where the dissidents are present. We believe this is to obtain field information on the situation."
"Meanwhile, from the occupied radio stations, the rebels again declared a maximum alert in the face of what they imagine could be the beginning of a removal/eviction operation against the popular and teachers' movement."
Over half of the Oaxaca's 3.2 million people, most of whom are indigenous, live in poverty, and 21.5 percent of those over 15 are illiterate, while the average number of years of schooling is 5.6 years -- almost two less than Mexico's national average. Many students in Oaxaca's rural schools lack books and desks. In May, tens of thousands of teachers seized the capital's leafy central plaza to demand wage increases and improved school conditions. The following month, Governor Ulises Ruiz sent police to attempt to retake the heart of the city. Since then, radical social movements of workers, peasants, students, women and others have joined the striking teachers, building street barricades and taking over radio and television stations. They demand that Ruiz resign, alleging that he rigged the 2004 election and uses paramilitary gangs to attack dissidents. A total of five "megamarches" were organized with the largest reaching the astonishing number of around 300,000 people, or one out of ten people who live in the state.
During the protests in Oaxaca, at least six people have been killed in violent incidents which apparently involved irregular armed groups linked to the Ruiz administration and the police, according to human rights organisations. A number of demonstrators have also been arrested and injured, and further assaults perpetrated against them by organized,
unidentified gangs of thugs have been reported.
One example of neoliberal "development" in Mexico with major implications for Oaxaca is Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), a transnational "mega-infrastructure" project that would transform the region's geography and economy if implemented. While claiming that one of its main goals is to improve the conditions for the people of the region, PPP is stealing land from indigenous people for infrastructure projects to move resources more quickly into the hands of multinational corporations and commodifying their culture for the tourist industry. One of the projects affecting Oaxaca is the creation of a super highway at Mexico's skinniest point, the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in order to move resources more readily across the land from the Atlantic to the Pacific. This transportation corridor will be surrounded with sweatshops, maquiladoras, operating without labor and environmental protections. For all of these objectives, neoliberal control over the government of Oaxaca is key to the realization of the PPP project.
Mexico has an ugly history of military repression that coincides with major world gatherings occurring inside the country. 38 years ago today, October 2nd, the Mexican military massacred hundreds of student protesters at Tlatelolco, just days before the 1968 Olympic Games began in Mexico City. If military violence against the pro-democracy protesters of Oaxaca occurs before, during or after the G8 meeting in Mexico, the G8 leaders as well as the Mexican military must be held accountable for the injuries and death. To prevent this, we demand that the G8 officials who are meeting this week in Mexico must publicly speak out to condemn the possibility of another Mexican massacre at Oaxaca.
We demand that the G8 end its support of destructive "carbon trading." The G8 is composed of the leaders of the richest 8 countries in the world, who are responsible for the policies of war, criminalization of cross-border human migration, and massive environmental destruction. While they claim to be meeting to solve the climate change crisis, they are in fact discussing carbon trading agreements that will allow corporations to profit while exporting their pollution to the global south. Carbon trading threatens to turn countries like Brazil into a "carbon sink" for the global north while ignoring the underlying capitalist ideology of endless growth and boundless consumption that is creating massive climate change.
Help us stop the G8 by slowing the propaganda systems that the G8+5 and the Mexican Government will be using during the meetings and the attacks to spread disinformation about their actions. As in our previous actions, people from all around the world will make their virtual presence manifest on the doorstep of the G8+5 and the Mexican Government.
To join the action, click here: http://sdhacklab.org/oaxaca
In addition to the virtual sit-in on the websites, you can also manifest your virtual presence via email or telephone:
Write to:
Vicente Fox Quesada
(Presidencia, Los Pinos)
Telephone:
011 52 (55) 2789 1100
011 52 (55) 18 7501 Atencion Ciudadana
Fax: (55) 52 77 23 76
email: vicente.fox.quesada@presidencia.gob.mx
Dear President Vicente Fox,
Please do not authorize the use of Federal force to resolve the current social and political dispute in Oaxaca.
Sincerely,
If you use email, please send copies to:
Prvesident Elect Felipe Calderón Hinojosa:
felipe@felipe.org.mx and
Secretary of Government: Carlos Abascal:
segob@rtn.net.mx
UPDATE: As of 10:50pm sunday night, there were reports that the attack had begun and that members of the PRI forces had begun attacking barricades which were defending radio antennas.
More news and updates about the unfolding situation in Oaxaca at:
http://narconews.com
More information on resistance to the G8+5 meeting in Mexico City at:
http://contrag8.revolt.org
To join the action, click here: http://sdhacklab.org/oaxaca
[http://contrag8.revolt.org]