No Borders.

 

        Solidarity, unity, co-operation and no borders are the foundation stones of our victory over this economic system that condemns millions to a life of misery. A system that has only one aim to increase profit, wealth and power to the few. As the inequality grows so does the anger and the resistance, however, likewise the state, the corporate beast's minder, increases it repression, surveillance and brutality to meet that resistance. It is aware of the rising anger and resentment, if unchecked could bring its plundering to an end, so it will increase its viciousness and brutal repression in an attempt to hold onto its very survival and to retain its wealth, power and privileges. 

       We either accept the life of inequality, injustice, mass poverty, murderous deprivation, total surveillance, and continuous wars, that this system hands us, or we resist with all the strength we can muster, and take our anger to the streets. Our world of resistance may seem fragmented, but make no mistake, it is the same battle across all borders, a struggle for justice, equality and the right to a decent life for all. If these struggles happening across the globe, come together across all states enforced borders, our victory is assured. The alternative is unacceptable.

 

 

         A call with passion and from the heart from Berlin.

The following is from Act For Freedom Now:

International Call for Action and Discussion Days in Berlin 30.10.-01.11.2020
International Demo in Berlin 31.10.2020
UNITED WE FIGHT!
       Connect Urban Struggles – Defend Autonomous Spaces
Over the last years we experience a global resurgence of reactionary politics. State and capital, in a constant process of intensifying exploitation and expanding repression, used the global capitalist crisis, which started a decade ago, as a chance to further restructure relations of power in their advantage. Their political answer is materialized in a shift to the right, with a political alliance of neoliberal economic policies coupled with strong nationalistic narratives and repressive policies against resistance and progressive movements. The new face of authoritarianism has unleashed an all out attack against individuals it considers unnecessary or those that choose to resist and collectivize against the ruin of their lives. In our current period, states the world over used measures against Covid-19 to extend repression, policing and surveillance against societies. At the same time, the failings of neoliberal healthcare systems have led to masses of deaths and increasing inequality due to access to healthcare.
To all of this, people in different areas of the world answer with massive resistance on the streets. Movements with different perspectives have revolted, for example in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, or more recently in France and the USA. The common thread of all these movements is their distance from institutionalized and systemic politics and the choice of self-organization and horizontalism in the fight against authority.
     The movement in Germany is fighting against exploitation and oppression in the belly of the beast. Since the movement reached a climax of mobilization against Hamburg’s G20 summit in 2017, the German state intensified and broadened its repressive arsenal with the goal to suppress and isolate the movement: this has seen the biggest public manhunt since the state repression since the 1960s and 70s, widening of police measures such as preventative arrests and extrajudicial surveillance, increased penalties for crimes against police and the ban of the popular German indymedia website “linksunten”.
In the city of Berlin over the past years the movement has come under constant attack through the eviction of its infrastructure, with gentrification manifesting itself in an attack on marginalized and struggling parts of society: rising rents making life unbearable, more than 5.000 forced evictions of houses per year, increased policing of public spaces and an overall changing social geography in the city. On the one hand this destroys or displaces spaces that the movement uses to support itself. Through heavy policing and state repression, subversive lifestyles and political organization is made impossible within public spaces. On the other hand capital is given space to invest and increase profitability through real-estate, privatization of security through cameras, fences and walls, smart city developments and big public-private partnership projects.
      The struggle of self-organized spaces in Berlin has developed against this background. The eviction of the bar collective Syndikat last August, and the broad mobilization of the movement against the eviction, was only the start of the upcoming fight for our infrastructures. The anarcha-queer-feminist house project Liebig34, the autonomous youth center Potse and the bar collective Meuterei are threatened by imminent evictions. The house project Rigaer94 was again raided in July, in an attempt to use the background of the raid several vain attempts to evict squatted flats were made without any success, since all flats could be held by the people inside or taken back. This phase of evictions might become the biggest attack on the autonomous infrastructure in Berlin since the 1990s.
       These collective spaces have chosen to stay and fight back in different ways. Their struggle has rallied the movement German-wide as a fight we are all a part of: against private property and capital, against the displacement of people from their houses, against gentrification of our neighborhoods, against a patriarchal and racist system which marginalizes, silences and oppresses the voices of those being exploited or deemed expendable for the system. Against this the projects put forward self-organization and solidarity, defiance of property and confrontation with the state and a direct attack on the oppressive social structures of hetero-patriarchy, nationalism and individualism.
      We are traversing a critical period, both for society and for radical movements worldwide. Under the dogma of “law and order”, state and capital are intensifying their attack on society and trying to further their dominance of all aspects of everyday life, stopping every collective vision and claim, and every perspective of resistance and struggle.
       Recognizing Berlin as the capital of one of the most dominant capitalist countries worldwide, we aim to intensify the social struggle in the heart of the beast. Giving a strong answer and creating perspectives against one of the most unbearable states of the world, that consists a model for many countries worldwide and which through its bureaucracy and structures infiltrates all the aspects of our lives leaving no space for self organization and anti-institutional struggles, will create a legacy not only for the local movement but for every rebellious cell worldwide.
       By the end of October an official eviction date of Liebig34 may be public. We will get together to prevent this. And if it has already been evicted in the weeks prior, we will take it back!
       We need all the force we can and call for support to defend our projects. Borderless solidarity is one of our strongest weapons. We want to use this opportunity to make the anarchist perspective more visible and bring the discussion about our ideas, praxis and strategies forward. The days prior to the demonstration on 31.10. will offer space for a plenary assembly, exchange, discussions and ways of actions on our common goals, strategies, occupying ground and collective defense.
        We consider this demonstration as an opportunity to come together to create a breach in their plans and multiple moments of ragefull, dynamic and militant experiences in which we abandon the defensive role and instead take the street as an active and offensive movement.
         Thus we hope to make these days part of a continuous discourse and not yet another unconnected event with no followup.
For these reasons we call for people to take the streets and destroy their plans of evictions. Although our fights in different corners of the worlds take different characteristics as we struggle in different contexts, borderless solidarity and the bridging of our struggles has been possible in the past, and is necessary for the future. Let’s choose confrontation and resistance, and seek them in collective moments beyond borders; let’s make their plans a disaster.
        We join the call of Terra Incognita to turn this year’s October into a month dedicated to solidarity and standing up for every occupied ground threatened by repression.
Lets bring our rage together!
Berlin 30.10.-01.11.202
International Demonstration 31.10.2020
via Liebig34.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk   

Rosa Nera.

       The Greek "New Democracy" government is continuing it ruthless policy of trying to eliminate all Squats, autonomous centres and voluntary migrant support groups. Far from this being a police operation these evictions look more like a military operation. Greece is not alone in trying to eliminate these self organising centres, it is the aim of all states to have everybody to follow the rules of the state, to survive. It and it alone needs to have the monopoly on how our lives are shaped. Leaving people to plan and shape their own lives would be the demise of the state. It will muster whatever savagery, terror, and intimidation, with the necessary brutality to ensure its own survival. The state exists by subservience and blind obedience.

The following from Anarchist News:

Not the best quality of video but you grasp the numbers protesting.

      They evacuated a squat but didn't expect 2000 people protesting on the same day...

       Following the police raid and evacuation of Terra Incognita 16 years old squat in Thessaloniki, Greece, on 17 August 2020, the police invasion at Libertatia Squat in Thessaloniki on 23 August 2020 and the arrest of 12 people rebuilding the roof that had been burnt by fascists during an attack, another squat was raided on Saturday 5 September 2020, this time in Chania, Crete where Rosa Nera Squat stood ground since 2004.
     Few hours later, following the police raid, hundreds of people marched in solidarity through the small greek island town in the afternoon and held a public assembly in the evening to decide the next steps of resistance.But that was not the end. The public assembly decided for another protest through the center of Chania on the same night, where beyond the greek government and police expectations more than 2.000 people took part in the small town of approximately 55.000 residents, marching in solidarity to the “Rosa Nera” Squat.
     The mass participation in the protests and assemblies is a clear sign of the Squat's openness and interconnection with society and the people's reaction to the plans of turning this historic building into a hotel owned by an Israeli company.
     During the last years, all the greek governments have carried out several campaigns of elimination of the self-managed spaces. What they want to achieve is that people find themselves only in the cafes, in the bars, and in the shopping centers as just consumers and customers. Consequently, the offensive that Rosa Nera is facing in Chania is not fortuitous. The Rosa Nera building belongs to the Polytechnic School of Chania, and for 16 years has been a place of struggle and emblematic culture, also covering accommodation needs. In its facilities, the tireless people who have worked hard to give life to the building have created a theater, a library and reading room, a space for presentations (of artistic creations), a children’s park, a construction workshop, a free bazaar of gifts and a communal kitchen for the production of bread.
     In these 16 years hundreds of events, concerts, presentations, debates, workshops, parties, cafes to support collectives and actions have been organized. All have had an anti-commercial character contrary to the government’s and the University of Crete plans to convert the squatted building into a hotel, so that only those with pockets full of money may enjoy the beautiful view from the Kasteli hill, where the Squat is located. To turn something which is free and accessible to everyone in the town, to a restricted area for the few willing to pay to enjoy it. The Rosa Nera Squat kept and ensured the free for all character of the place intact. And that is why you see so many people in the streets protesting the eviction.

This video from Squatting Will Stay.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

Robroyston.

       Politicians and Councillors must hate old people, the older we get the further back our memories go. I presume my memories go back before some of our Councillors and politicians, who are now "re-imaging" Glasgow, were born. This "re-imaging" involves changing public assets to money making entities or selling off some of those assets. In such deals you can bet that the private sector gain immensely from this "re-imaging". So a wee delve into one of those memories, Robroyston Hospital, it treated tuberculosis, among other forms of illnesses and for a time 1918-1919 handled these poor souls who were maimed, broken and blind from WW1, built 1918, sold off 1977. Public opinion was against the closure of this hospital, but it went ahead. Decisions made behind closed doors never work out in the best interest of the general public.
Hansard:

       I am glad to have this opportunity to raise in the House the subject of the proposed closure of Robroyston Hospital, Glasgow, and I can tell the House at the outset that I have here a telegram from the local health council supporting me in my efforts to prevent its closure. That in itself is an indication of the way in which the decision has been carried along. The first that the staff of the hospital, the local health council, local councillors and I knew of the proposed closure was when we read about it in the Press.

      The hospital covered a large expanse of land to the north of Glasgow, it consisted of two main buildings, one brick built E-shaped the other H-shaped, and a series of nine brick built houses for wards. An additional eight houses were built to the NE and at a later some thirteen wooden huts were added  to the N. All of the above were set within extensive gardens and grounds. The facilities for patients at the hospital included two tennis courts, a bowling green and a putting green.

     The sad tale of the usual rip-off of the public sector by the private sector at the hands of our corporate minded, bumbling politicians.

The Herald:

     TABLE THE spectre of a 15-year-old property deal hangs over any plans which the Greater Glasgow Health Board might have to dispose of two of its prime hospital sites. In 1977, the Government sold the 600-acre site of the former Robroyston Hospital in the north of Glasgow to Aberdeenshire-based property developers Elinacre for #410,000.
       Mr Ian MacDonald, Elinacre's principal, who died in 1988, then sold on parcels of land to housing developers for #2m.

       Of course we will be told that safeguards have been put in place so that such bungling ineptitude and cavalier attitude to our public assets, can't happen again, but the same private plundering of public assets still goes on. This is not going to change until we change the entire economic system to one of public ownership freed from the profit motive. 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Libertad.

      Prisons are state institutions that are meant to subdue dissent, create subservience, breed submission. History has proved that these institution have, very often failed in their purpose. The human spirit so often overcomes attempts to shackle its desire for freedom and justice. I have no doubt that this desire will eventually win, and we will pull down the walls of these symbols of state control and cruelty, along with the system that requires them for its very existence. There is no place for prisons in any civilised society, they are there to protect the status-quo, to keep wealth and power where it is, clasped in the greedy hands of the pampered, privileged, parasite class. 

The following from Anarchists Worldwide:

Santiago, Chile: Letter from Anarchist Prisoner Mónica Caballero
Palabras de la compañera Monica Caballero desde la cárcel de San Miguel ($hile)
       For those opposed to this system of terror, prison is always a bitter pill and it always hurts.
      Prison and I are old acquaintances, on more than one occasion I have sat at his table, over the years we have changed and we have both learned from one another… but no matter how much time I spend in prison, I remain the same. Prison is still the monstrous phagocyte of power that grows with submission and repentance, and I continue with the same seditious desires of yesteryear.
     The powerful succeeded in locking up my restless body, they tried to guard it for many years, but even though it is caged, my heart is still out there far from fences, high walls and watchful eyes… the grey of this place only touches me superficially.
      The prison is another place of struggle on the road to confrontation, the anti-authoritarian confrontation for me has not finished, it has only changed shape.
Dear Juan Aliste, Joaquín García, Marcelo Villarroel and Dinos Giagtzoglou‘s words are a breath of fresh air in this cell.
       There is still much to build and to destroy!
Active solidarity with the Mapuche political prisoners on hunger strike

Long live Anarchy!

Monica Caballero S.
Anarchist prisoner.
Santiago Chile
September 2020.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

Oh Jesus.

     I posted this little video away back in July, 2012, because I found it amusing, I still do. Anything for a wee giggle in these tying times. If the Jesus guy did come back today, what would he be like, I think all Christians should be prepared for the fact that, unlike them, he may have moved with times.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Tax Money.

       Covid19 might be a stressful period for most ordinary people, but to the government and large companies it’s an opportunity to shift taxpayers money into the corporate coffers. March this year our financial wizard, Chancellor Rishi Sunak, came up with, Covid Corporate Financial Facility, CCFF for short, a scheme to help what he considered large companies that were important to the UK economy, small companies were not included, just the big rich mob. This handout was given with minimum conditions. 

 

       While receiving billions from the taxpayers, through the CCFF scheme, these rich companies saw fit to pay out approximately £11.5 billion to shareholders and investors, and in gratitude for this taxpayers handout, they paid off thousands of employees. It is reckoned that of 26 companies involved in this CCFF taxpayers gift to big rich companies, have paid of approximately 43,000 workers.
       While this money plundering was going on the NHS was desperately crying out for PPE, struggling with staff shortages and lack of equipment. Care home residents and the staff were being denied testing facilities and left to suffer and die. This is capitalism, the economy is sacred, the corporate is valued above the well-being of the people. Every penny of the billions spent by the government in handouts to big business will have to be paid back to the financial mafia by you and I, the taxpayer. We will pay for it with unemployment, severe cuts to social services and the selling of public assets.

 

         No doubt, bumbling Boris and his rich coterie will be shouting about investing in massive infrastructure projects, to get the economy growing, what this translates as, is handing more billions of taxpayers money to large corporate very rich companies to build a host of showpiece entities that will be of little or no use to the ordinary people. HS2 springs to mind. 

 

      Surely if people look at how the system works they must draw the conclusion that this has to stop, this insane economic system of greed that feeds a small clique of parasites to the detriment of the many, has to be destroyed.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

Mr. President.

      Most people seem to accept that Trump is the worst President of the USA ever. That's quite an accolade considering the liars and butchers that have held that post before him. To me the main difference with Trump and the other  figureheads of American imperialism, is the fact that he has a big mouth and doesn't hide his racism and fascist and homophobic views, he openly revels in them.

The following extracts are from Arrezafe:

Monday, April 16, 2018: Peace protesters trying to tear down the Truman statue in Athens

       Two days ago, Greek police forces, on orders from the SYRIZA-ANEL government, brutally attacked anti-war protesters as they tried to topple the statue of US President Harry Truman. This 3.2-meter statue - "a fossil of bloody US imperialism" , as the KKE called it in a statement - has been in the center of the Greek capital since 1963.
      Recent events give us an opportunity to remember who Harry Truman really was. A representative of US imperialism, Truman was the author of the most horrendous war crime of the previous century. We refer to the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

         "Being in possession of a bomb, we have used it ... We will continue to use it until we completely destroy the military power of Japan. Only its surrender will stop us ... We thank God that he has placed it in our hands, and not in the hands. of our enemies, and we pray that He guides us to use it in his path and for his purposes . "

        These gruesome words were spoken on August 9, 1945, by the President of the United States, Truman, during a radio address to the American people. It was three days since the terrorist Enola Gay had dropped the atomic bomb called “Little boy” on Hiroshima and another bomb was sowing death, destruction and chaos in Nagasaki.-------

And:

  ----------Numerous American officials, as well as academics, have exposed Truman's blatant lies. For example, the US Strategic Bombing Survey group, which had been assigned by President Truman himself to study air strikes in Japan, was writing in a report prepared in July 1946:
      "Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the opinion of the Study that certainly before December 31, 1945, and in all probability before November 1, 1945, Japan it would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not gone to war and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated . "
       For his part, the then Supreme Commander of all Allied Forces who later became President of the United States, General Dwight Eisenhower, said: "The Japanese were ready to surrender and there was no need to hit them with that hideous thing . " We could cite many testimonies from various officers of the United States Army (Admiral Leahy, General MacArthur, Under Secretary of War McLoy, etc.) that confirm all of the above.
       History has documented the tremendous effects of the nuclear holocaust on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Truman and his administration are responsible for more than 200,000 deaths and hundreds of thousands of radiation-related post-attack casualties.-------

And: 

      "Hero" for the Greek bourgeoisie - "Butcher" for the people.

      The war criminal Harry Truman, who sowed destruction in Japan, is the same butcher who, three years later, ordered the bombing of the heroic guerrillas of the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE) in the mountains of Grammos. It was during the Greek Civil War that the United States intervened to help the Greek bourgeois class against the Democratic Army of Greece . In February 1948, American General James Van Fleet arrived in Athens and became the commander-in-chief of the Greek bourgeois army. 

         In 1949, the Grammos Mountains in northern Greece became the field where the American air force first used Napalm B bombs. In just one battle, in Grammos, the Americans dropped 338 napalm bombs from US positions. DSE. Years later, napalm bombs were used by American assassins in numerous imperialist wars: from Korea to Vietnam and from the 1991 Gulf War to the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

      Quite a record for a fundamentalist Christian, one of the many who have no problem with mass killings and then asking their god of love and peace to bless their actions. Trump is at home, among a long line of liars, hypocrites and mass murders, who have sat on that throne of savage American imperialism.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk  

Proactive.

      With the big social media platforms, all run by billionaires, who, to put it mildly, have no love of anarchists, ever tightening controls on who gets in and who doesn't, should we now be organising to walk away before the kick us all out? Proactive rather than reactive. We know that it is coming, it's just a matter of time.

The following food for thought from Anarchist News:

      Last week, after Crimethinc, IGD, Enough is Enough and others were banned from Fedbook, our friend Ziq gave us food for thought with this post on raddle:

      We can't keep expecting platforms owned by far-right billionaires to stay honest. Anarchists are the biggest threat to any capitalist, so of course they're going to shut us down at every opportunity.
      [There are many important anarchist projects, each serving a different purpose], but they can't continue to exist in a vacuum while the social media behemoths are busy closing ranks to ensure all our efforts are stifled...
      [raddle has] always encouraged anarchists to use our platform to grow their own platforms. But it's not a one-way street. There needs to be a concerted effort between all the aforementioned anarchist venues to amplify each other's voices. Cross promotion is the only thing that will keep us all alive and kicking...

        If you were to promote other anarchist sites/venues/projects/whatever, how would you do it? Would it look like Facebook and Twitter, Cabal and Plemora, banner drop and billboard, or something completely different? What are the pros and cons of each?
       Who would you promote? Who would you not? Let's not just have a list of names; let's hear why you chose this one over that one, why anews was on top of your list, and why you'd never in a thousand years amplify [you name it].
        Does amplifying voices mean banding together, like Ziq suggests, or does it mean going it alone, but louder?
      Who already does promotion the way you'd like it to be done? Who does it in a way that you can't stand?
       Is it as important as Ziq says to cross promote each other's voices? If you think it is, how would you like to see it play out in the days ahead? If not, what are otherways of keeping us all alive and kicking?

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

Hit The Needy.

        It is a strange and unjust society that when savings and cuts have to be made, it is always the most vulnerable and those in need that have to take the hit. Glasgow City Council are proposing saving money by closing all but two of the city's Citizens Advice Bureaus and cutting support to rape crisis centres among other things that the ordinary people sometimes have to rely on. Now you don't get any prizes for guessing who is most likely to visit these places. You wont find Jim Ratcliffe, Scottish billionaire, waiting, or any of his clique hanging around in the queue. They will always have their team of expensive expert lawyers to sort out any problems they may encounter.

       It always appears beyond Councillors and MP's imagination to find ways of getting those savings and administering cuts from that upper echelons of the wealthy bunch that sit very comfortably with no need for such common things as Citizens Advice Bureaus. 

       Today, Wednesday 2nd. of September, there was a small group outside Glasgow City Chambers protesting these unfair and unnecessary attacks on the most vulnerable in our society. It was a day of torrential rain and I admire their dedication and sincerity for holding this protest in such appalling weather. However, I feel that it was the wrong place and the wrong time. The City Chambers was empty and locked up, the meeting regarding these cuts will be held via virtual conferencing, with the participants unaware of any protest. No doubt the virtual meeting will make it extremely difficult or impossible to hear what is being said, nor will the public be able to contribute to the debate. Perhaps I'm wrong on that and they will send out the link to the virtual meeting to ever citizen of Glasgow. I'm sure Billy Connolly could turn these city chambers actions into a joke, well basically that's what it is, a sick and cruel joke at that.

Some photos of those intrepid protestors:

 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Greek Summer.

      While tourists fly in to Greece and its beautiful beaches and islands, perhaps they should take a moment and have a look at what is happening to the ordinary people who inhabit that little patch of the planet.
        Police violence is not something that is limited to any one patch on this planet, every state has it array of armed thugs, and experience tells us that violence by police is part and parcel of their routine. They must serve their master, the state, obediently and wholeheartedly.

The following extracts are from crimethinc: 

 Summer in Greece: New Democracy Edition.

          In Greece, following the accession of the New Democracy party and a ban on freedom of assembly, the simmering conflict between anarchists and the far right continues, even in the middle of summer. In this report, we cover gentrification, escalating tensions with Turkey, ecological struggles, refugee and prisoner solidarity, the eviction of the historic Terra Incognita squat, and more.
         The Greek government and its bootlickers and beneficiaries are stumbling towards disaster. The economic crisis of 2008 will soon be seen as easier times. While tourists wander Greece dropping coins into the pockets of the bosses, only half of society can afford to take a holiday this year—something considered indispensable in the hot Greek summer. COVID-19 cases are at record highs. The daily infection rates are much higher than they were when the country was in formal lockdown back in March. Yet the state continues cutting hospital budgets in order to redirect funds to police agencies, focusing on its human opponents rather than the virus.
        In Greece, as elsewhere in the world, revolutionaries, the excluded, and the exploited struggle with self-preservation both materially and psychologically in the face of the slow-motion COVID-19 apocalypse and the right-wing police state. While new measures are going into effect and a second lockdown seems likely, we find strength in understanding that both our precarity and the struggle against it are shared globally. The struggle here is rooted deep in the discontent of countless beautiful hearts and a history in the streets: “Even if we never win, we will always fight!” -------

Police Violence:   Rest in Power, Vassilis Maggos 

 

 

     ---------As described in our last report, the anarchist Vassilis Maggos was brutally beaten by police during a demonstration expressing solidarity with those arrested while protesting a cement factory in Volos. He suffered intense psychological trauma while in recovery from the beating. Police seized his body from his family in order for the police to use their own coroner, following a public outcry about the 26-year-old’s death. The police brought in Eleni Kalyva to conduct the autopsy—she is a well-known ally that the police have repeatedly employed to investigate controversial cases in which officers may have been at fault. She is known to have fascist sympathies and a close relationship with the current government.
       Eleni Kalyva’s conclusion was that Vassilis died of acute pulmonary edema. The police claim that this was not due to the beating; however, the full investigation has not been made public, and his family is seeking outside help. Vassilis spent his final weeks of his life recovering from the pain and trauma of being beaten by police. Using a familiar playbook, right-wing social media have cited personal issues such as drug use as a way to suggest that Vassilis was responsible for his own death. Even if drug use had something to do with his passing, the trauma of being beaten and tortured by police was clearly the cause of his tragic death, and drug use or other issues do not diminish the responsibility of the police.
       The police also brought Eleni Kalyva to investigate the murder of a girl in Trikala in late July, when a 16-year-old girl who was known to have a relationship with a police officer was found dead outside of a church. Kalyva was called in to investigate her death after suspicions began to circulate that the girl had been murdered by her police officer boyfriend. Now we are told that the girl climbed to the top of the church and killed herself—which would be a surprising feat, given the details of the situation, but Kalyva confirmed the claims of the police.
      Anarchists and anti-fascist football fans have spread murals, banners, and graffiti across Greece remembering Vassilis Maggos. A Molotov cocktail attack against a government building in Volos took place in this his name, as well as an arson attack on a bank in Marroussi, Athens. He will be remembered.-----

The world-famous Terra Incognita squat before its eviction.

Conclusion 

         It’s August in Greece and most people are away from their homes—or wish they could be. It’s hot and the situation is grim. Yet even amid the harsh summer, there have been demonstrations against the bill described in our previous report banning unpermitted protests. Fresh graffiti all over the country expresses insurrectionary discontent.
      The church and the far right count on the neo-liberal New Democracy administration to coddle them. Greece received some seventy billion euros in COVID-19 relief from the European union, but we know that money will chiefly serve to provide more contracts to the wealthy and to hire more police to protect their power and enforce their laws. Whatever happens in the coming months, we hope the fall will see a new wave of resistance ignite in Greece and around the world.

Read the full article HERE: 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk  

Tory War.

       Party political politics have never been my strong point, but I can't help take a little giggle of glee at the possibility of the coming war within the Tory party. The financial pundits of both sides are as usual clamoring to get the "national" debt under control. However that's where the split comes. The two factions are gearing up for a fight, on the one side is the bumbling buffoon Boris brigade, sailing along on his ginormous ego. Boris's election promise stated that there would be no return to austerity, he promised more jobs with massive spending on infrastructure projects and his ego demands that, come what may. Of course that requires more money, so his camp want to plunder the middle class with more taxes etc. Most financial pundits agree that to try and plunder the poor would be unpopular, but also impracticable, as there is not enough avenues there to sort out the £2trillion UK debt. The other side in this party squabble claim that a policy of plundering the middle class would damage the crumbling economy even more. Of course that last statement translates into hurting some of their friends and perhaps costing them their comfy job in parliament.

      Which ever way it goes the real financial Mafia will demand that they get back their £2trillion they loaned the UK treasury for their covid19 pantomime, no matter who the Tory party decide to screw. So you can rest assured that they will, and we the ordinary people will feel the pain, come what may. Of course decimating the middle class will more or less display what anarchists have always said, in this society there is only two classes. All this working class, middle class and upper middle class, is just an illusion based on propaganda to create that vision of the ladder you can climb to get to the top. However it is extremely difficult to climb a ladder made of illusions.

       So who is going to win, the Boris brigade plundering the middle class to pay off the debt, and at the same time, spend, spend more debt on infrastructure. Which is just another method of taking public money and handing it to their corporate buddies. Or the good old fashion die-hard Tories who see the plundering of the poor the only decent solution to their crumbling sacred economy and ever growing debt. 

     Of course we, the ordinary people, could throw a spanner in both their plans, by deciding to take control of our lives and sorting out our problems all by ourselves, without any political party's blessing.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

1820 Remebered.

 

        Yesterday, Sunday 30th August was the 200th. anniversary of the state murder of one of the radicals that played a role in the 1820 Insurrection. He was James "Purlie" Wilson.
        To mark this barbaric act by the state and to honour his memory, there was an event near the spot on Glasgow Green where the state carried out this barbaric act of murder, by first hanging him, and then be-heading him. To honour this defiant radical, there was a Tree of Liberty planted near the spot. The state as usual believes that by killing the person and making an example of them, they will kill the ideas that they stood for, freedom, justice and equality for all. Of course they are deluded.
       James "Purlie" Wilson made a defiant speech from the dock, which was repeatedly interrupted by the judge in an attempt to stop his words from being made public. Again they failed miserably.

       We had an unexpected privilege at the event as one of James "Purlie" Wilson's descendants turned up.

Jimmy Carruthers, descendant of James "Purlie" Wilson, standing beside the newly plant Tree of Liberty planted in honour of his ancestor.

       James "Purlie" Wilson's speech from the dock.

       "I am not deceived. You might have condemned me without this mummery of a trial. You want a victim. I will not shrink from the sacrifice. I am ready to lay down my life in support of these principles which must ultimately triumph."
       "My Lords and Gentlemen, I will not attempt the mockery of a defence. You are about to condemn me for attempting to overthrow the oppressors of my country. You do not know, neither can you appreciate, my motives. I commit my sacred cause, which is that of freedom, to the vindication of posterity."
     "You may condemn me to immolation on the scaffold, but you cannot degrade me. If I have appeared as a pioneer in the van of freedom's battles; if I have attempted to free my country from political degradation; my conscience tells me that I have only done my duty.
      "Your brief authority will soon cease, but the vindictive proceedings of this day shall be recorded in history. The principles for which I have contended are as immutable, as imperishable, as the eternal laws of nature. My gory head may in a few days fall on the scaffold and be exposed as the head of a traitor, but I will appeal with confidence to posterity.”
      "When my countrymen will have exalted their voices in bold proclamation of the rights and dignity of humanity, and enforced their claim by the extermination of their oppressors, then, and not till then, will some future historian do my memory justice, then will my name and sufferings be recorded in Scottish history - then my motives will be understood and appreciated; and with the confidence of an honest man, I appeal to posterity for that justice which has in all ages and in all countries been awarded to those who have suffered martyrdom in the glorious cause of liberty."
      Crowd shouts Murder …."Murder", and "He is a murdered man",
     Cries of sympathy exuded from the gathering and "Shame, Shame, he dies for his country!" could be heard as Wilson climbed the scaffold. The crowd's noisy manner caused an officer of 3rd Dragoons to panic, and surmising that a rescue was about to be attempted, ordered his men to charge and disperse some of them. The mass of people remained sullen but tense. Not able to be quartered due to the agitation of the crowd Executioner stated "This is the head of a traitor" responding Crowd Vehement cries of "It is false, he has bled for his country!",
     In the gloaming of that same day, Purlie Wilson's daughter and niece reopened the grave and manoeuvred the coffin over the cemetery wall into a waiting cart that was probably owned by Wilson's friend, William Fleming. The remains were back in Strathaven before dawn where a large crowd waited to show respect to the deceased. There was no demonstration, a condition made to allow the "stealing" of the body. When the coffin lid was raised, it was noticed that the dropped handkerchief had been retrieved to cover the deceased's countenance. (This handkerchief is preserved and can be viewed in the John Hastie Museum, Strathaven.)
        The next day James "Purlie" Wilson was buried in the Old Graveyard just a few metres from his back door, not as a traitor, but as a revered patriot. Mrs. Wilson never recovered from the tragedy and spent many a sad and weary night mourning by her husband's grave.

Some photos from the event:

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk