reclaiming spaces: news

PRESS RELEASE FROM SULUKULE STUDIO :

Why we didn’t apply for the Deutsche Bank Urban Age Award?

THOSE WHO CAUSE FORCED EVICTIONS SHOULD NOT GIVE URBAN AWARDS!

As the Sulukule Studio, we didn’t apply for the Urban Age Award, both due to Deutsche Bank’s role in the mortgage crisis, which triggered the current global crisis, and also for its practices of forced evictionsin the USA, after the break-out of the crises.

One of the major actors of global finacial capitalism, Deutche Bank, like all the likes of it, has been in the business of sub-prime mortgage bonds - bonds that were dished out to people with limited purchasing power. It was obvious that this balloon would burst one day, price to be paid by the mortgage owners. Finance opportunists like Deutche Bank, despite knowing what was ahead, carried on with the business in a short-sighted way, a practice that is harshly criticised today even in G20 meetings. Such fecklessness cannot be allowed to hide behind “social responsibility” projects like the Deutsche Bank Urban Age Award.

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November 4th, 2009 | Tags: Deutsche Bank, Istanbul, Resistance, Sulukule, Urban Age, Turkey | Category: Foreclosure, Right to the City, Uncategorized, Urgent calls and petitions, movements, Germany, Turkey, evictions & demolitions, transactions & privatisations |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

October 20th, 2009 | Tags: call for solidarity, DAL, Right to the City | Category: Right to the City, movements, evictions & demolitions, action |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

The London rampART Social Centre was evicted at 5:30am this morning by 45 police, bailiffs and a priest.

After over 5 years and many eviction scares it has finally happened… 3 people and a dog were inside when police attempted to chanisaw the door. They also had climbers going up to the roof conjuring up memories of the raid during the G20 in April. Police are blocking the entrance to all three roads leading to the social centre with vans and their bodies.

http://london.indymedia.org/articles/2587

More news to come particularly to better understand the legality and the circumstances around this heavy policed eviction.

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Eviction of the new squat in Vienna – call for solidarity actions!

http://hausprojekt.noblogs.org/category/english

On the 2nd of October we squatted the Triesterstrasse 114, an old school building in the south of Vienna to establish a houseproject: a space for self-organised, non-commercial projects and communal living.

The initial concept was to have an action-week with programs and discussions there and force the city to talk to us (which they otherwise don’t do). We got violently evicted today (12 of October) and therefore we call for solidarity actions!

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October 15th, 2009 | Tags: Police, Resistance, Social Centre, repression | Category: Right to the City, Urgent calls and petitions, movements, repression, evictions & demolitions, action, squats |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

September 30th, 2009 | Category: Uncategorized |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

In one of the poorest shack settlements in Durban, South Africa, armed thugs have been reported to have killed settlement residents and destroyed their home in a coordinated and racially motivated attack. Local police appear to be entirely complicit in these attacks, as do local members of the African National Congress. This petition asks President Jacob Zuma to intervene directly, and to remind him and those involved in this violence that the world watches their actions.

Sign the petition against the violence here

Latest statements:

The ANC Has Invaded Kennedy Road
http://www.abahlali.org/node/5784
The ANC has invaded Kennedy Road. We have been arrested, beaten, killed, jailed and made homeless by their armed wing. This is what it took for Yakoob Baig and Jackson Gumede to finally take back the settlement.

This attack is an attempt to suppress the voice that has emerged from the dark corners of our country. That voice is the voice of ordinary poor people. This attack is an attempt to terrorise that voice back into the dark corners.

September 28th, 2009 | Tags: petition, shack dwellers, violent evictions, South Africa | Category: Urgent calls and petitions |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

http://www.archive.org/details/MaglianaResiste

Squatted arrested, after a search on the “8marzo” houses (Magliana zone, in Rome).
The raid came after the evaquation of an other squotted house - “Regina Elena” - on the 1st of September.

The whole operation is part of a mediatic and politic campaing in progress in Rome, against the movement for housing.

here (in Italian)
http://roma.indymedia.org/node/12128

Una trentina di famiglie in emergenza abitativa organizzate con i movimenti di lotta per la casa.
Alle 04.30 un centinaio di carabinieri si presenta presso la scuola e effettua 5 arresti

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September 26th, 2009 | Category: Uncategorized |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

The “Dignified” Destruction of Calais Refugee “Jungle”

22/09/2009: At 8am in the morning some 600 CRS riot police moved on the Calais refugee “Jungle”, under the orders of French immigration minister Eric Besson, to destroy the camp and arrest all the remaining refugees.

The camp usually held up to 1500 people, but many had fled and gone underground, leaving 300 refugees, nearly half of those were children.

Besson announced the operation would be “dignified”, but this footage reveals a very different picture, as children as young as 11-years were dragged away and seperated from the only parental figures they had known since fleeing their country.

The camp was cleared in nearly 15 minutes. All refugees were put on buses and taken away to the nearby detention centre in Coquelles to be processed. Then bulldozers and men with chainsaws entered the camp to start the dismantling process.

At 1pm Besson arrived to view his success and paraded around the flattened camp with the international media circus he so desperately needed to publicise his poltical triumph, just as Nicolas Sarkozy (then immigration minister) had done during the Sangatte camp closure in 2002.

Related Films

http://current.com/items/88967594_after-sangatte-europes-untold-refugee-crisis.h…

http://current.com/items/90495639_video-rush-the-jungle-refugee-camp-calais-fran…

Blog

http://jasonnparkinson.blogspot.com/2009/09/dignified-destruction-of-calais-refu…


http://jasonnparkinson.blogspot.com/

September 25th, 2009 | Tags: calais, Capitalism, immigration, repression | Category: Right to the City, Uncategorized, France, UK, repression, evictions & demolitions, action |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

Donald Trump has asked Aberdeenshire Council to use their power to force families out of their homes.  He wants to clear people from the land to build a controversial housing and golf complex.  He expects the council to help by using Compulsory Purchase powers which are meant to be reserved for public infrastucture like schools, roads and hospitals.

The council will vote on 1st October. It’s up to local councillors to decide whether or not to force local families out of their homes.

We have until 1st October to push Aberdeenshire Council to stand up to Donald Trump. Please sign the petition now and help build the pressure.

Please sign the petition here

To find out more about the campaign and read the stories of those threatened with losing their homes please visit the Tripping Up Trump campaign web site.

September 23rd, 2009 | Category: Urgent calls and petitions |  Print This Post | Leave a comment

http://bashne.net/

Petition against the Construction of the Okhta Center Tower (Saint Petersburg)

We, the undersigned, would like to express our opposition to the planned construction of the 396-meter-tall Okhta Center skyscraper in Saint Petersburg.

We believe that construction cannot be allowed to go ahead. Erecting a building of this height would irreversibly ruin the Petersburg cityscape, which is recognized as a cultural treasure not only within our city, but also around the country and the world.

Please also read the text on the “urgent petitions” page.

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September 14th, 2009 | Tags: Capitalism, Right to the City, urban speculation | Category: Uncategorized, Urgent calls and petitions, Russia |  Print This Post | Comments (4)