A hunger strike by 300 migrants across Greece begins today. It is the latest in a long line of hunger strikes by refugees denied asylum by a regime that currently only approves 0.6% of all applications it receives, that has been regularly criticised by the UN and the rest of the EU for the appalling conditions in its detention centres and its general abuse of foreigners and that now seeks to join the ever-growing list of states that think that building a wall to keep 'them' out is a reasonable solution to a 'problem' that steadfastly refuses to go away. The European Court of Human Rights has also recently criticised Greece (along side Belgium) for its mistreatment of Afghan asylum seekers and 6 EU countries (UK, Sweden, Norway, Germany, Finland and Denmark) have suspended Dublin II returns of refugees to the country until Greece can guarantee asylum seekers' their human rights and due process in asylum cases.
Hunger Strikers' Statement:
Jan. 25, 2011 Contra Info
We are immigrants and refugees from across Greece. We came here persecuted by poverty, unemployment, wars, and dictatorships. Western multinational companies and their political servants in our countries, left us with no choice but to risk our lives ten times to get to the door of Europe. The West which robs us of our home places to achieve far better standards of living, is our only hope to live like humans. We entered Greece (normally or in other ways) where we work to feed ourselves and our children. We remain at the indignity and the darkness of lawlessness, for the benefit of employers and the State’s agencies by the wild exploitation of our work. We live by our sweat and with the dream to have equal rights with our Greek colleagues, at some point.
Lately, things have become very difficult for us. Wages and pensions are reduced; everything becomes more and more expensive; so the immigrants are presented as if they were the culprits, as they are to blame for the misery and wild exploitation of the Greek workers and minor entrepreneurs. The propaganda of fascist and racist parties and organizations has become the State’s official talk about the immigration issue. Their phraseology is being reproduced unaltered by the mass media when they refer to us. Their ‘proposals’ are enshrined as governmental policies: wall at Evros, navigable army camps and European military forces in the Aegean Sea, crackdowns and assault squads in cities, mass deportations. They try to convince the Greek working-class people that we suddenly constitute a threat against them, that we are to blame for the unprecedented attack they endure by their own governments.
The lies and brutality must be answered immediately; we immigrants and refugees will give this answer. We move forward with our lives now to stop the injustice against us. We demand the legalization of all immigrants, equal political and social rights and obligations like the Greek employees. We ask our Greek fellow workers, everyone who suffers from the exploitation of their efforts, to stand beside us; to support our struggle, so that lies and injustice, fascism and totalitarianism of political and economic elites do not prevail in their home place as well. All these have prevailed in our own countries, and forced us to migrate to be able to live with dignity, we and our children.
We have no other way to make our voice heard, our rights to be spread. Three hundred (300) of us begin nationwide hunger strike in Athens and Thessaloniki on 25 January 2011. We put ourselves at risk, because this is no decent life. We prefer to die here, rather than our children to live what we suffered.
Assembly of immigrant hunger strikers in Greece
January 2011
Tuesday, 25 January 2011
Friday, 21 January 2011
Free The Yarl's Wood 3!
*Campaign planning meeting, 6pm-7.30pm, Friday 28 January*
Fin Future, 225-229 Seven Sisters Road, Finsbury Park, London, N4 2DA (2 minutes from Finsbury Park tube station - come out main entrance, go past Arsenal shop, turn right down Seven Sisters Rd, go under railway bridge and Fin Future is on your right with big windows and yellow/green window frames or come out Seven Sisters Rd exit, and it's just on your right)
In February 2010, women at Yarl's Wood immigration prison went on hunger strike to demand an end to indefinite and abusive imprisonment. The women experienced violent attacks and abusive treatment in an attempt to end their protest. Six women were accused of being ring-leaders and moved into isolation and prisons. Nearly a year later, three women remain in prison without charge: Aminata Camara, Denise McNeil and Sheree Wilson.
Come along to this meeting to plan how to take the campaign for their release forward. Hear messages from the women and plan how to respond to their requests for solidarity.
The venue is wheelchair accessible. Please let us know [freedenisenow@gmail.com] if you need childcare for the meeting, and we'll arrange a creche.
More information on Free Denise McNeil:
http://www.ncadc.org.uk/campaigns/DeniseMcNeil.html
Read the recent article in the Observer:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jan/16/denise-mcneil-yarls-wood
Stay in touch with the campaign: freedenisenow@gmail.com
Join the Facebook group:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Free-Denise-Now/174533002581566
Fin Future, 225-229 Seven Sisters Road, Finsbury Park, London, N4 2DA (2 minutes from Finsbury Park tube station - come out main entrance, go past Arsenal shop, turn right down Seven Sisters Rd, go under railway bridge and Fin Future is on your right with big windows and yellow/green window frames or come out Seven Sisters Rd exit, and it's just on your right)
In February 2010, women at Yarl's Wood immigration prison went on hunger strike to demand an end to indefinite and abusive imprisonment. The women experienced violent attacks and abusive treatment in an attempt to end their protest. Six women were accused of being ring-leaders and moved into isolation and prisons. Nearly a year later, three women remain in prison without charge: Aminata Camara, Denise McNeil and Sheree Wilson.
Come along to this meeting to plan how to take the campaign for their release forward. Hear messages from the women and plan how to respond to their requests for solidarity.
The venue is wheelchair accessible. Please let us know [freedenisenow@gmail.com] if you need childcare for the meeting, and we'll arrange a creche.
More information on Free Denise McNeil:
http://www.ncadc.org.uk/campaigns/DeniseMcNeil.html
Read the recent article in the Observer:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jan/16/denise-mcneil-yarls-wood
Stay in touch with the campaign: freedenisenow@gmail.com
Join the Facebook group:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Free-Denise-Now/174533002581566
Monday, 17 January 2011
300 Refugees To Start Mass Hunger Strike In Greece
We are refugees, men and women, from all around Greece. We came here chased by poverty, unemployment, wars and dictatorships. The multinational companies of the Western world and their political servants in our countries did not let us have another choice than risking our lives for dozens of times to come until the front-door of Europe. The Western countries that loot our places, with an infinitely better standard of living there in West, are our only hope to live as human beings. We came (with an ordinary way or not) and we work here in order to survive, us and our children. We live under the indignity and the darkness of lawlessness, in order to benefit the employers and agencies of the state from the wild exploitation of our work. We live by our sweat and dream one day to have equal rights with their Greek colleagues.
During the last time things have become very difficult for us. As far as the wages and pensions are cut-out, as far as the prices rise up, so far the migrant is presented as the blameworthy, as the responsible for the misery and the wild exploitation of Greek workers and small local companies. The propaganda of racist and fascist parties and organizations has already turned into the formal language of the State about immigration. Their phraseology gets already expressed in the exact same way by the Mass Media when they talk about us. Their “proposals” are already enshrined as governmental policies. Wall at Evros River, floating concentration camps and euro-army in the Aegean Sea, pogroms and assault forces in the cities, massive deportations. They are trying to make the Greek workers believe that we are a sudden threat for them, that it is us to blame about the attack of their own governments against them.
The answer against this lies and barbarity must be given now and we will give it, men and women refugees. We confront, with our own lives as a weapon, now to stop the injustice against us. We demand the legalization of all immigrants; we call for equal civil and social rights and obligations as Greek workers and employees. We ask from our fellow Greek workers from each human being that now suffers from the exploitation of his/her own sweat, to stand in our side. To support our struggle, not to let it prevail in their own place lies and injustice, fascism and totalitarianism of political and economic elites. Namely, what has prevailed in our own countries and forced us to migrate to be able to live with dignity, we and our children.
We have no other way to make our voice be heard, to let you learn about our rights. Three hundred (300) of us, we start a Pan-Hellenic Hunger-Strike in Athens and Thessaloniki on the 25th of January. We set our lives in danger, because one way or another we do not experience living conditions with dignity. We prefer to die here, instead of letting our children experience the same with what has happened to us.
- The Assembly of Refugee Hunger Strikers
During the last time things have become very difficult for us. As far as the wages and pensions are cut-out, as far as the prices rise up, so far the migrant is presented as the blameworthy, as the responsible for the misery and the wild exploitation of Greek workers and small local companies. The propaganda of racist and fascist parties and organizations has already turned into the formal language of the State about immigration. Their phraseology gets already expressed in the exact same way by the Mass Media when they talk about us. Their “proposals” are already enshrined as governmental policies. Wall at Evros River, floating concentration camps and euro-army in the Aegean Sea, pogroms and assault forces in the cities, massive deportations. They are trying to make the Greek workers believe that we are a sudden threat for them, that it is us to blame about the attack of their own governments against them.
The answer against this lies and barbarity must be given now and we will give it, men and women refugees. We confront, with our own lives as a weapon, now to stop the injustice against us. We demand the legalization of all immigrants; we call for equal civil and social rights and obligations as Greek workers and employees. We ask from our fellow Greek workers from each human being that now suffers from the exploitation of his/her own sweat, to stand in our side. To support our struggle, not to let it prevail in their own place lies and injustice, fascism and totalitarianism of political and economic elites. Namely, what has prevailed in our own countries and forced us to migrate to be able to live with dignity, we and our children.
We have no other way to make our voice be heard, to let you learn about our rights. Three hundred (300) of us, we start a Pan-Hellenic Hunger-Strike in Athens and Thessaloniki on the 25th of January. We set our lives in danger, because one way or another we do not experience living conditions with dignity. We prefer to die here, instead of letting our children experience the same with what has happened to us.
- The Assembly of Refugee Hunger Strikers
Tuesday, 11 January 2011
Defend Dale Farm!
Help Resist Ethnic Cleansing
7pm Wednesday 19th January at Unite House, 128 Theobald's Road, London WC1 8TN
Dale Farm is the last major surviving Traveller site in Essex, following a series of brutal evictions elsewhere over the years. There are around 1000 residents altogether. Those now facing eviction (yet again) took over a scrap yard next door to a long established legal site. The racist local Council is determined to drive all the Travellers they can out of the area. This is to the extent of refusing offers from the government's Department of Communities to provide alternative sites on land it owns. Though the Council continues to demand 10 million pounds from the same government towards policing the eviction!
We'll be getting updates , including a recent short film; discussing the situation; and looking at ways we can help the residents resist the impending eviction.
Denounced as an act of ethnic-cleansing even by the opposition Labour Party, it could cost a whopping £13 million and last up to thee weeks to complete, according to police and local authority estimates.
Answering an appeal first put out by film star Venessa Redgrave hundreds of people have volunteered to create a human shield to protect the children of Dale Farm from the bulldozers.
Many have pledged to join mothers and chain themselves to caravans in order the thwart the notorious Constant & Co bailiffs, the anti-Gypsy security firm hired for the job. They will also defy the movement of heavy plant machinery supplied by H.E.Services and George Moore, both earning themselves a bad name for aiding violent action against the homeless.
Dale Farm is a long established Travellers' community in the countryside near Basildon, Essex. The largest of its kind in the country, it is home to nearly 1,000 people. Half the residents are now under threat of imminent eviction, after being refused permission to live on their own land.
In response to an Urgent Action Appeal from the residents of Dale Farm, including Richard Sheridan, head of the Gypsy Council, the No One Is Illegal meeting will dicuss practical solidarity and non-violent defence tactics that have been prepared in advance of the eviction, expected this spring.
Travellers have been living on the threatened part of the Dale Farm estate for ten years. They have a strong attachment to the nearby catholic church and their children go to local schools.
The community has been resisting forced eviction attempts by Basildon District Council since May 2005 when it voted to clear a large part of the settlement at a costy of £3m. Basildon has refused all attempts to regularise the planning situation and instead have contracted Constant & Co, Both Labour and Liberal councillors have denounced the eviction as ethnic-cleansing.
In March 2010 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) issued a letter urging the UK Government to suspend the eviction until an positive solution is achieved, with the participation of the community,guaranteeing protection of housing rights through provision of adequate alternative accommodation.
(http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cerd/docs/UK_12.03.2010.pdf).
After a long struggle to register as homeless, some families have been offered substandard council flats. All have refused as they want to keep their community together and continue a traditional way of life. However, county court judge has ruled that they should accept conventional housing and appeal to the high court is now being prepared. It will be argued that an offer of land for the Travellers from the Homes and Communities Agency makes it possible and practical for Basildon to allow development of a new mobile-home park as an alternative for those facing eviction.
Meanwhile, the community-based Dale Farm Housing Association has submitted a planning application to create such a park on HCA land.
After the recent eviction of seven families from Hovefields near Dale Farm the council failing to provide any alternative accommodation. All were left homeless and most were moved on by police under s61 of the Criminal Justice Act wherever they tried to camp.
During the eviction legal observers identified numerous breaches of international human rights law, including the disruption of children's education, and a failure to keep heavy machinery within the safety perimeter.
Two supporters were arrested early in the day, and a seventy-two year old man, John Lee, had his nose fractured after his face was smashed against his caravan.
This eviction tore apart a community and has shown Basildon's complete disrespect for Travellers' right to private and family life and the secure enjoyment of their homes (Article 8, European Convention on Human Rights [ECHR]).
The new UK Coalition Government has cancelled the duty to provide much needed new caravan parks for nomadic Gypsies and Travellers and removed the requirement to designate land for their accommodation.
Many thousands of Traveller families are thus forced to live illegally on land they have purchased but where they have been denied through strict planning laws to set up permanent homes.
Another generation of Travellers are losing the chance of a regular education for their children, while the old and the sick are deprived of care and medical attention.
The stand being made by residents at Dale Farm is therefore vital to the future of Romanies and Travellers in the UK. It should be seen as part of the fight-back by Roma all over Europe following the burning of camps in Italy, deportations from France, murders by neo-fascists in Hungary and Romania, and wholesale ethnic-cleansing from Kosovo, among many other acts of intolerance and racism that have occurred in the past two decades.
The Dale Farm community is seeking your solidarity. Practical support is needed in the form of legal observers and human rights monitors, as well as nonviolent resistance during the planned eviction operation.
Currently, support and solidarity action is called for. In particular opposition needs to be mobilized against the special funding by the Home Office of the Dale Farm eviction. Essex police have asked Theresa May to provide up to £ 10m to cover policing. Without this funding the eviction attempt might have to be abandoned.
Send your email messages to: mayt@parliament.uk
Dear Theresa May,
At a time when cuts are being made to many important services, and homelessness is on the rise, we urge that the Home Office decline to provide the £10 million funding sought by Essex police for policing the Dale Farm eviction operation.
This eviction, the biggest of its kind in UK history, aims at destroying the homes nearly a hundred families. It is being opposed both by the Liberal Democrat and Labour councillors on Basildon District Council as inhumane, disproportionate and an act of ethnic-cleansing, besides being a waste of public money.
To find out more information please come to the information night and discussion, and look at the website below.
Website: http://dalefarm.wordpress.com
Facebook Group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=124229427082
Basildon Echo (unfriendly local paper)___________
7pm Wednesday 19th January at Unite House, 128 Theobald's Road, London WC1 8TN
Dale Farm is the last major surviving Traveller site in Essex, following a series of brutal evictions elsewhere over the years. There are around 1000 residents altogether. Those now facing eviction (yet again) took over a scrap yard next door to a long established legal site. The racist local Council is determined to drive all the Travellers they can out of the area. This is to the extent of refusing offers from the government's Department of Communities to provide alternative sites on land it owns. Though the Council continues to demand 10 million pounds from the same government towards policing the eviction!
We'll be getting updates , including a recent short film; discussing the situation; and looking at ways we can help the residents resist the impending eviction.
Denounced as an act of ethnic-cleansing even by the opposition Labour Party, it could cost a whopping £13 million and last up to thee weeks to complete, according to police and local authority estimates.
Answering an appeal first put out by film star Venessa Redgrave hundreds of people have volunteered to create a human shield to protect the children of Dale Farm from the bulldozers.
Many have pledged to join mothers and chain themselves to caravans in order the thwart the notorious Constant & Co bailiffs, the anti-Gypsy security firm hired for the job. They will also defy the movement of heavy plant machinery supplied by H.E.Services and George Moore, both earning themselves a bad name for aiding violent action against the homeless.
Dale Farm is a long established Travellers' community in the countryside near Basildon, Essex. The largest of its kind in the country, it is home to nearly 1,000 people. Half the residents are now under threat of imminent eviction, after being refused permission to live on their own land.
In response to an Urgent Action Appeal from the residents of Dale Farm, including Richard Sheridan, head of the Gypsy Council, the No One Is Illegal meeting will dicuss practical solidarity and non-violent defence tactics that have been prepared in advance of the eviction, expected this spring.
Travellers have been living on the threatened part of the Dale Farm estate for ten years. They have a strong attachment to the nearby catholic church and their children go to local schools.
The community has been resisting forced eviction attempts by Basildon District Council since May 2005 when it voted to clear a large part of the settlement at a costy of £3m. Basildon has refused all attempts to regularise the planning situation and instead have contracted Constant & Co, Both Labour and Liberal councillors have denounced the eviction as ethnic-cleansing.
In March 2010 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) issued a letter urging the UK Government to suspend the eviction until an positive solution is achieved, with the participation of the community,guaranteeing protection of housing rights through provision of adequate alternative accommodation.
(http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cerd/docs/UK_12.03.2010.pdf).
After a long struggle to register as homeless, some families have been offered substandard council flats. All have refused as they want to keep their community together and continue a traditional way of life. However, county court judge has ruled that they should accept conventional housing and appeal to the high court is now being prepared. It will be argued that an offer of land for the Travellers from the Homes and Communities Agency makes it possible and practical for Basildon to allow development of a new mobile-home park as an alternative for those facing eviction.
Meanwhile, the community-based Dale Farm Housing Association has submitted a planning application to create such a park on HCA land.
After the recent eviction of seven families from Hovefields near Dale Farm the council failing to provide any alternative accommodation. All were left homeless and most were moved on by police under s61 of the Criminal Justice Act wherever they tried to camp.
During the eviction legal observers identified numerous breaches of international human rights law, including the disruption of children's education, and a failure to keep heavy machinery within the safety perimeter.
Two supporters were arrested early in the day, and a seventy-two year old man, John Lee, had his nose fractured after his face was smashed against his caravan.
This eviction tore apart a community and has shown Basildon's complete disrespect for Travellers' right to private and family life and the secure enjoyment of their homes (Article 8, European Convention on Human Rights [ECHR]).
The new UK Coalition Government has cancelled the duty to provide much needed new caravan parks for nomadic Gypsies and Travellers and removed the requirement to designate land for their accommodation.
Many thousands of Traveller families are thus forced to live illegally on land they have purchased but where they have been denied through strict planning laws to set up permanent homes.
Another generation of Travellers are losing the chance of a regular education for their children, while the old and the sick are deprived of care and medical attention.
The stand being made by residents at Dale Farm is therefore vital to the future of Romanies and Travellers in the UK. It should be seen as part of the fight-back by Roma all over Europe following the burning of camps in Italy, deportations from France, murders by neo-fascists in Hungary and Romania, and wholesale ethnic-cleansing from Kosovo, among many other acts of intolerance and racism that have occurred in the past two decades.
The Dale Farm community is seeking your solidarity. Practical support is needed in the form of legal observers and human rights monitors, as well as nonviolent resistance during the planned eviction operation.
Currently, support and solidarity action is called for. In particular opposition needs to be mobilized against the special funding by the Home Office of the Dale Farm eviction. Essex police have asked Theresa May to provide up to £ 10m to cover policing. Without this funding the eviction attempt might have to be abandoned.
Send your email messages to: mayt@parliament.uk
Dear Theresa May,
At a time when cuts are being made to many important services, and homelessness is on the rise, we urge that the Home Office decline to provide the £10 million funding sought by Essex police for policing the Dale Farm eviction operation.
This eviction, the biggest of its kind in UK history, aims at destroying the homes nearly a hundred families. It is being opposed both by the Liberal Democrat and Labour councillors on Basildon District Council as inhumane, disproportionate and an act of ethnic-cleansing, besides being a waste of public money.
To find out more information please come to the information night and discussion, and look at the website below.
Website: http://dalefarm.wordpress.com
Facebook Group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=124229427082
Basildon Echo (unfriendly local paper)___________
Sunday, 2 January 2011
Dale Farm Eviction Info Night @ Colwey Club, Brighton
Talk, film and discussion about practical solidarity action to support the Dale Farm Community: Brighton, 8pm, Wednesday 5th January 2011, Cowley Club, London Road.
Dale Farm is a long established Travellers' community in the countryside near Basildon, Essex. This, the largest of its kind in the country, is home to nearly 1,000 people.
Half the residents are now under threat of imminent eviction, after being refused permission to live on their own land.
In response to an Urgent Action Appeal from the residents of Dale Farm, including Richard Sheridan, head of the Gypsy Council, we are holding an information evening in Brighton to gain support for practical solidarity action.
Travellers have been living on the threatened part of the Dale Farm estate for ten years. They have a strong attachment to the nearby catholic church and their children go to local schools.
The community has been resisting forced eviction attempts by Basildon District Council since May 2005 when it voted to clear a large part of the settlement at a cost of £3m.
Basildon has refused all attempts to regularise the planning situation, preferring the enforcement option, and have contracted a notorious bailiff company, Constant & Co, which specializes in evicting Gypsies. Both Labour and Liberal councillors have denounced the eviction as an act of ethnic-cleansing.
In March 2010 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) issued a letter urging the UK Government to suspend the eviction until an positive solution is achieved, with the participation of the community, guaranteeing protection of housing rights through provision of adequate alternative accommodation. http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cerd/docs/UK_12.03.2010.pdf).
After a long struggle to register as homeless, some families have been offered substandard council flats. All have refused as they want to keep their community together and continue a traditional way of life. However, county court judge has ruled that they should accept conventional housing and appeal to the high court is now being prepared. It will be argued that an offer of land for the Travellers from the Homes and Communities Agency makes it possible and practical for Basildon to allow development of a new mobile-home park as an alternative for those facing eviction.
Meanwhile, the community-based Dale Farm Housing Association has submitted a planning application to create such a park on HCA land.
After the recent eviction of seven families from Hovefields near Dale Farm the council failing to provide any alternative accommodation. All were left homeless and most were moved on by police under s61 of the Criminal Justice Act wherever they tried to camp.
During the eviction legal observers identified numerous breaches of international human rights law, including the disruption of children's education, and a failure to keep heavy machinery within the safety perimeter.
Two supporters were arrested early in the day, and a seventy-two year old man, John Lee, had his nose fractured after his face was smashed against his caravan.
This eviction tore apart a community and has shown Basildon's complete disrespect for Travellers' right to private and family life and the secure enjoyment of their homes (Article 8, European Convention on Human Rights [ECHR]).
The new UK Coalition Government has cancelled the duty to provide much needed new caravan parks for nomadic Gypsies and Travellers and removed the requirement to designate land for their accommodation.
Many thousands of Gypsy families are thus forced to live illegally on land they have purchased but where they have been denied through strict planning laws to set up permanent homes.
Another generation of Travellers are losing the chance of a regular education for their children, while the old and the sick are deprived of care and medical attention.
The stand being made by residents at Dale Farm is therefore vital to the future of Gypsies and Travellers in the UK. It should be seen as part of the fight-back by Roma all over Europe following the burning of camps in Italy, deportations from France, murders by neo-fascists in Hungary and Romania, and wholesale ethnic-cleansing from Kosovo, among many other acts of intolerance and racism that have occurred in the past two decades.
The Dale Farm community is therefore seeking your solidarity. Practical support is needed in the form of legal observers and human rights monitors, as well as non-violent resistance during the planned eviction operation, which could last three weeks.
In the meanwhile support and solidarity action is called for. In particular opposition needs to be mobilized against the special funding by the Home Office of the Dale Farm eviction. Essex police have asked Theresa May to provide up to £10m to cover policing. Without this funding the eviction attempt might have to be abandoned.
Send your email messages to: mayt@parliament.uk
To find out more information please come to the information night and discussion, and look at the website below.
Website: http://dalefarm.wordpress.com
Facebook Group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=124229427082
Dale Farm is a long established Travellers' community in the countryside near Basildon, Essex. This, the largest of its kind in the country, is home to nearly 1,000 people.
Half the residents are now under threat of imminent eviction, after being refused permission to live on their own land.
In response to an Urgent Action Appeal from the residents of Dale Farm, including Richard Sheridan, head of the Gypsy Council, we are holding an information evening in Brighton to gain support for practical solidarity action.
Travellers have been living on the threatened part of the Dale Farm estate for ten years. They have a strong attachment to the nearby catholic church and their children go to local schools.
The community has been resisting forced eviction attempts by Basildon District Council since May 2005 when it voted to clear a large part of the settlement at a cost of £3m.
Basildon has refused all attempts to regularise the planning situation, preferring the enforcement option, and have contracted a notorious bailiff company, Constant & Co, which specializes in evicting Gypsies. Both Labour and Liberal councillors have denounced the eviction as an act of ethnic-cleansing.
In March 2010 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) issued a letter urging the UK Government to suspend the eviction until an positive solution is achieved, with the participation of the community, guaranteeing protection of housing rights through provision of adequate alternative accommodation. http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cerd/docs/UK_12.03.2010.pdf).
After a long struggle to register as homeless, some families have been offered substandard council flats. All have refused as they want to keep their community together and continue a traditional way of life. However, county court judge has ruled that they should accept conventional housing and appeal to the high court is now being prepared. It will be argued that an offer of land for the Travellers from the Homes and Communities Agency makes it possible and practical for Basildon to allow development of a new mobile-home park as an alternative for those facing eviction.
Meanwhile, the community-based Dale Farm Housing Association has submitted a planning application to create such a park on HCA land.
After the recent eviction of seven families from Hovefields near Dale Farm the council failing to provide any alternative accommodation. All were left homeless and most were moved on by police under s61 of the Criminal Justice Act wherever they tried to camp.
During the eviction legal observers identified numerous breaches of international human rights law, including the disruption of children's education, and a failure to keep heavy machinery within the safety perimeter.
Two supporters were arrested early in the day, and a seventy-two year old man, John Lee, had his nose fractured after his face was smashed against his caravan.
This eviction tore apart a community and has shown Basildon's complete disrespect for Travellers' right to private and family life and the secure enjoyment of their homes (Article 8, European Convention on Human Rights [ECHR]).
The new UK Coalition Government has cancelled the duty to provide much needed new caravan parks for nomadic Gypsies and Travellers and removed the requirement to designate land for their accommodation.
Many thousands of Gypsy families are thus forced to live illegally on land they have purchased but where they have been denied through strict planning laws to set up permanent homes.
Another generation of Travellers are losing the chance of a regular education for their children, while the old and the sick are deprived of care and medical attention.
The stand being made by residents at Dale Farm is therefore vital to the future of Gypsies and Travellers in the UK. It should be seen as part of the fight-back by Roma all over Europe following the burning of camps in Italy, deportations from France, murders by neo-fascists in Hungary and Romania, and wholesale ethnic-cleansing from Kosovo, among many other acts of intolerance and racism that have occurred in the past two decades.
The Dale Farm community is therefore seeking your solidarity. Practical support is needed in the form of legal observers and human rights monitors, as well as non-violent resistance during the planned eviction operation, which could last three weeks.
In the meanwhile support and solidarity action is called for. In particular opposition needs to be mobilized against the special funding by the Home Office of the Dale Farm eviction. Essex police have asked Theresa May to provide up to £10m to cover policing. Without this funding the eviction attempt might have to be abandoned.
Send your email messages to: mayt@parliament.uk
To find out more information please come to the information night and discussion, and look at the website below.
Website: http://dalefarm.wordpress.com
Facebook Group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=124229427082
Wednesday, 29 December 2010
Abdel Must Stay In Brighton
Stop His New Year’s Deportation - ACT NOW
Abdelkrim Madjoudj (HOref: M702098). Abdelkrim is a 39 years old gentleman, Algerian who is currently detained at Brook House since last 17/12/2010 and has already been given direction removals for New Year’s Eve. Abdel has been living in the UK for 13 years and he is very much loved in the Brighton community.
Abdelkrim arrived initially as a medical visitor in the UK in the 16th December 1994, sought an extension to stay unsuccessfully, and returned home to Algeria in September 1995. Abdelkrim was detained on return and tortured and accused of being involved with criminals and being a member of a banned political party. He was found not guilty of the alleged crime of failure to report criminals, but by that time Abdelkrim had been physically and mentally scarred by his experience, and he required psychological treatment as a result. He is afraid that this would happen again if send back to Algeria.
Abdelkrim returned to the UK in January 1998 and lived with his brother in Brighton. He did not apply for asylum or otherwise come to the attention of the authorities until August 2009 when Immigration Officers came to his flat in Brighton. He then applied to remain in the UK for compassionate reasons under the Article 3 (prohibits torture, and "inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”) and Article 8 (provides a right to respect for one's "private and family life, his home and his correspondence" ) of the European Convention of Human Rights. It was refused. Home Office states in the refusal letter that Abdel had not strong links in the UK and because he was living illegally in the UK, he should be removed.
Abdelkrim is not working in the UK still suffers physically from back pain. His brother is a successful businessman in the UK. Abdel is supported financially by his brother, has never been a burden on the State and if he were permitted to stay in the UK, he would be an asset to society as he has a degree in Civil Engineering.
Abdel is a committed and loved volunteer at Migrant English Project and Brighton Voices in Exile. MEP is run completely by volunteers and provides free English lessons and a safe and social space. Abdel regularly cooks for up to 50 people at Migrant English Project and he takes the lead responsibility for this. He is friendly and welcoming to new members and he is dearly missed already. After 13 years he is fully engaged in the Brighton and Hove community.
We believe that his removal is an abuse of process as he has no chance to lodge an appeal over the Christmas period with support organisations in Brighton closed, solicitors closed and the Home Office are closed for this period of the year.
And we know he is extremely distressed by the possibility of been removed after living in the UK for 13 years.
What can you do to help?
1) Call the Home Office now demanding he has a right to appeal his deportation order and ask that your message is recorded 0870 606 7766.
2) Write to the Home Secretary Theresa May and let her know that Abdelkrim should be released from detention and given permission to stay in the UK.
[Download model letter]
Rt. Hon Theresa May, MP
Secretary of State for the Home Office,
2 Marsham St London SW1 4DF
Fax: 0044 (0)20 7035 4745 or 02072191145
Email:
mayt@parliament.uk
UKBA: publicenquiries@UKBA.gsi.gov.uk,
public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
CITTO: citto@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
MEP (Migrant English Project)
STOP PRESS: [31/12]
Abdel's flight has been cancelled but we expect the Border's Agency to try to deport him again some time in the New Year, so we advise people to keep on contacting the Home Office and Abdel and his supporters would like to thank everyone who has offered support so far.
Abdelkrim Madjoudj (HOref: M702098). Abdelkrim is a 39 years old gentleman, Algerian who is currently detained at Brook House since last 17/12/2010 and has already been given direction removals for New Year’s Eve. Abdel has been living in the UK for 13 years and he is very much loved in the Brighton community.
Abdelkrim arrived initially as a medical visitor in the UK in the 16th December 1994, sought an extension to stay unsuccessfully, and returned home to Algeria in September 1995. Abdelkrim was detained on return and tortured and accused of being involved with criminals and being a member of a banned political party. He was found not guilty of the alleged crime of failure to report criminals, but by that time Abdelkrim had been physically and mentally scarred by his experience, and he required psychological treatment as a result. He is afraid that this would happen again if send back to Algeria.
Abdelkrim returned to the UK in January 1998 and lived with his brother in Brighton. He did not apply for asylum or otherwise come to the attention of the authorities until August 2009 when Immigration Officers came to his flat in Brighton. He then applied to remain in the UK for compassionate reasons under the Article 3 (prohibits torture, and "inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”) and Article 8 (provides a right to respect for one's "private and family life, his home and his correspondence" ) of the European Convention of Human Rights. It was refused. Home Office states in the refusal letter that Abdel had not strong links in the UK and because he was living illegally in the UK, he should be removed.
Abdelkrim is not working in the UK still suffers physically from back pain. His brother is a successful businessman in the UK. Abdel is supported financially by his brother, has never been a burden on the State and if he were permitted to stay in the UK, he would be an asset to society as he has a degree in Civil Engineering.
Abdel is a committed and loved volunteer at Migrant English Project and Brighton Voices in Exile. MEP is run completely by volunteers and provides free English lessons and a safe and social space. Abdel regularly cooks for up to 50 people at Migrant English Project and he takes the lead responsibility for this. He is friendly and welcoming to new members and he is dearly missed already. After 13 years he is fully engaged in the Brighton and Hove community.
We believe that his removal is an abuse of process as he has no chance to lodge an appeal over the Christmas period with support organisations in Brighton closed, solicitors closed and the Home Office are closed for this period of the year.
And we know he is extremely distressed by the possibility of been removed after living in the UK for 13 years.
What can you do to help?
1) Call the Home Office now demanding he has a right to appeal his deportation order and ask that your message is recorded 0870 606 7766.
2) Write to the Home Secretary Theresa May and let her know that Abdelkrim should be released from detention and given permission to stay in the UK.
[Download model letter]
Rt. Hon Theresa May, MP
Secretary of State for the Home Office,
2 Marsham St London SW1 4DF
Fax: 0044 (0)20 7035 4745 or 02072191145
Email:
mayt@parliament.uk
UKBA: publicenquiries@UKBA.gsi.gov.uk,
public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
CITTO: citto@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
MEP (Migrant English Project)
STOP PRESS: [31/12]
Abdel's flight has been cancelled but we expect the Border's Agency to try to deport him again some time in the New Year, so we advise people to keep on contacting the Home Office and Abdel and his supporters would like to thank everyone who has offered support so far.
Tuesday, 21 December 2010
Free The Yarl's Wood 3
In February 2010 prisoners at Yarl's Wood immigration prison organised a hunger strike. They demanded an end to indefinite and abusive imprisonment. Their courageous protest lasted five weeks, despite violent attacks by guards at the detention centre.
As retribution several people involved in the hunger strike were moved to prisons. Three of those targeted in this way are still behind bars: Denise McNeil, Sheree Wilson and Aminata Camara. They have been away from their families, friends and communities for too long.
Their struggle was “for everyone in detention”. We need to support those who take action on the inside. When they use prison to try to silence resistance we will fight back. At the start of a new year, let’s show them that they have our support and that the struggle for freedom goes on.
At 4pm on New Year’s Eve demonstrate outside Holloway Prison, Parkhurst Road, in solidarity with the Yarl’s Wood 3. Please invite your friends and family. All ages are welcome. Bring noise-makers.
The nearest underground station to HMP Holloway is Caledonian Road on the Piccadilly line. Buses from outside the station go to the prison.
The Yarl’s Wood 3 will also have bail hearings in the coming month. Your support is very welcome. If you would like to come to the court to show support for them contact freedenisenow@gmail.com.
For a good source of more information visit:
http://www.ncadc.org.uk/campaigns/DeniseMcNeil.html
As retribution several people involved in the hunger strike were moved to prisons. Three of those targeted in this way are still behind bars: Denise McNeil, Sheree Wilson and Aminata Camara. They have been away from their families, friends and communities for too long.
Their struggle was “for everyone in detention”. We need to support those who take action on the inside. When they use prison to try to silence resistance we will fight back. At the start of a new year, let’s show them that they have our support and that the struggle for freedom goes on.
At 4pm on New Year’s Eve demonstrate outside Holloway Prison, Parkhurst Road, in solidarity with the Yarl’s Wood 3. Please invite your friends and family. All ages are welcome. Bring noise-makers.
The nearest underground station to HMP Holloway is Caledonian Road on the Piccadilly line. Buses from outside the station go to the prison.
The Yarl’s Wood 3 will also have bail hearings in the coming month. Your support is very welcome. If you would like to come to the court to show support for them contact freedenisenow@gmail.com.
For a good source of more information visit:
http://www.ncadc.org.uk/campaigns/DeniseMcNeil.html
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