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Author: Tom Anderson

  • Justice for Bristol Protesters is demanding a public inquiry over police violence

    Campaign group Justice for Bristol Protesters (JBP) has launched an online petition calling for a public inquiry over police brutality in Bristol.

    JBP includes the families of some of those injured and imprisoned after the Kill the Bill protests in March 2021. They want an investigation into police violence against people during these protests.

    Over 100 injured

    JBP points out that police injured over 100 people during the demonstration against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (now an Act) on 21 March 2021.

    Police attacked protesters with batons and used their riot shields as offensive weapons, bringing them down on people’s heads. Officers also deployed pepper spray, horses and dogs against the crowd.

    People fought back, smashing the windows of Bridewell police station and torching several police vehicles.

    JBP calls for a public inquiry into violence

    In total, Bristol Crown Court has sentenced the rebels of Bridewell to over 110 years in prison. But JBP says that no proper inquiry has taken place into the police’s actions. 

    According to a press statement from JBP:

    The police injured more than 100 protesters during the demonstration after indiscriminately attacking the crowd, with some people so severely hurt that they required hospital treatment. In contrast, the police claims that their officers sustained injuries during the protest were later found to be false. The police claim, widely reported on the night, that two officers suffered broken bones and one a punctured lung was later retracted by Avon and Somerset police.

    Heidi Gedge is the mother of Mariella Gedge-Rogers, who was jailed in 2022 for her part in the protests. She said:

    The protesters, who were standing up for everyone’s right to freedom of speech, were brutally attacked by police. Then many were subjected to harsh prison sentences when they tried to defend themselves. 

    Heidi described how police brutally pinned her daughter to the ground:

    This included my daughter, who in an unprovoked attack, was pinned to the ground by 3 police officers, her hand was stamped on and she feared for her life. She is currently serving 5.5 years in prison for riot yet not a single officer has been exposed, questioned or called to account for their outrageous behaviour.

    The Canary interviewed Mariella before her sentencing, you can read her account here, and view JBP’s petition for a public inquiry here.

    Featured image via Shoal Collective

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Another death in custody at Bristol’s HMP Eastwood Park

    Content warning: contains descriptions of prison violence, self-harm, and suicide

    Another prisoner has died in custody at Bristol’s HMP Eastwood Park. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) confirmed to the Canary that an individual died in the prison on 10 June 2023.

    This is is part of a repeated pattern of deaths in custody at the prison. HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP) wrote that conditions at Eastwood Park were both “terrible” and “wholly unsuitable” in a statement in February 2023. Violence and self-harm is rife.

    Remembering those who have died in Bristol prison

    This latest death is at least the second to take place this year at a Bristol prison. In March 2023, Keith Gadd took his own life at HMP Bristol. Keith was serving an indeterminate sentence under imprisonment for public protection (IPP) rules. IPP prisoners have no set release date. The courts give them an initial ‘tariff’ during sentencing, but their release date is determined by a parole board. Many IPP prisoners serve a decade or more after their tariff is up.

    On Sunday 9 July demonstrators gathered outside HMP Eastwood Park to mourn Taylor, another IPP prisoner. It marked one year since Taylor took his own life at the prison. According to a statement from Bristol Anarchist Black Cross, prison officers viciously assaulted Taylor just weeks before he died.

    The IPP sentence has often been described as psychological torture. In fact, at least 81 IPP prisoners have died by suicide since the Labour government created the sentence in 2003. IPP sentences were abolished in 2012, but the state didn’t apply this retrospectively. Thousands of people remain in prison with no release date in site.

    Staff failing prisoners

    On 28 December 2022, 48-year-old Clare Dupree died in hospital. She had been admitted to hospital after a fire started in her cell. Prisoners have accused Eastwood Park of not doing enough to help her. On 9 January 2023 the Canary reported:

    Under prison regulations, prison staff are supposed to be trained to use Respiratory Protective Equipment (RPE) in order to respond to fires inside prisons. The policy allows trained staff wearing RPE to enter a cell where a fire is taking place – if it is safe to do so – in order to remove prisoners. The prisoners’ accounts suggest that this did not take place.

    Kayleigh, another prisoner at HMP Eastwood Park, took her own life in summer 2023. Prisoners say that officers assaulted Kayleigh shortly before she committed suicide.

    We contacted the MoJ about the latest death at the prison. It said that the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman would investigate it, but declined to make any comment over the circumstances.

    Officers ‘use force’ to deal with self harm

    It’s clear from the reports the Canary has received from prisoners over the past year, and from a scathing report from HMIP, that Eastwood Park is a deeply dangerous institution.

    HMIP inspected Eastwood Park in October 2022. It found that several women were being held in bloodstained cells, that officers were not properly trained, and that they often used force to deal with prisoners self harming. Self harming was common among the prisoners, and staff’s use of force had increased by 75% since the last report. One prison inspector admitted that the conditions were the worst he had ever seen.

    Deaths in custody are all too common at HMP Eastwood Park. The October 2022 HMIP report found that four people had taken their own lives at the prison since their last inspection. We know that at least two more prisoners – the latest individual, and Clare Dupree – have died at Eastwood Park since then.

    Not just one rotten prison

    However, it is not just one rotten prison, or a few violent officers. The death of Keith a few miles away at HMP Bristol is an example of that. The problem is the whole carceral system, which is hardwired to dehumanise and brutalise the people it imprisons.

    Our communities need to defend themselves against the violence of the prison system. We need to respond to every death in prison custody with the same grief and rage as when the cops murder people on the street. We need to come together and create a movement that can put an end to the violence and brutality of imprisonment for good.

    Featured image via Hédi Benyounes/Unsplash

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • University College London security guards protest against ‘fire and rehire’ at university open day

    UCL security staff held protests over University College London’s (UCL) plans to fire and rehire staff at the university’s open days on Friday 30 June and Saturday 1 July.

    What’s more, the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) has said that the plans are “racist”, as:

    the majority BAME outsourced workers are denied the same rights, pay and working conditions as directly employed staff.

    The union is aiming to highlight the university’s unfair and racist employment practices to prospective students. UCL Unison also supported the protests:

    The IWGB Universities of London branch tweeted:

    The IWGB stated that the security guards are the only group of UCL staff that the univerity is targeting for fire and rehire. The security workforce is made up 99% Black and Brown people.

    Massive pay cut

    40 staff members could lose their jobs. Those who reapply for positions face reduced hours and a pay cut of up to £13,500.

    The security staff have been campaigning against pay and conditions at UCL since 2019. The workers say that the fire and rehire plans would create a two-tier system at the university. In this system, the majority-Black and Brown security workforce would be paid less.

    UCL outsources its security workforce to private contractor Bidvest Noonan. Last month, security staff lobbied parliament over the controversial fire and rehire policies. Since then, Ian Mearns MP has criticised Bidvest Noonan in the house of commons.

    Reneging on their commitment

    Back in 2019, UCL made a commitment to ensure parity between outsourced and in-house staff. However, the IWGB said that UCL’s failure to intervene in Bidvest Noonan’s plans shows that they have gone back on their promise.

    IWGB pointed out that the redundancy package that Bidvest Noonan is offering is still based on a two-tier system. What the company is offering to outsourced security staff isn’t in line with what in-house staff would get. The IWGB wrote:

    The procedure being followed for the redundancies does not match UCL’s own redundancy procedures. UCL’s redundancy procedures require a minimum 3 month collective consultation period, whereas Bidvest Noonan has only given just over 1 month, and Bidvest Noonan is offering significantly lower voluntary redundancy payments than mandated by UCL’s policy.

    ‘I can barely support my family’

    One of the security guards, Jolly Seaka, explained how UCL had gone back on its word:

    Four years ago UCL promised us they would treat us with the same fairness and dignity as their in-house staff.

    I took them at their word, and am now paying the price. UCL has gone back on their commitment and, in the middle of a cost of living crisis, are allowing our livelihoods to be cut away from under our feet.

    Seaka concluded by saying:

    I can barely support my family as it is – it doesn’t bear thinking about what could happen if these plans go ahead

    ‘Disdain for working-class communities’

    Aisha Yusuf of Black Lives Matter commented on the university’s plans. She said:

    This reveals a level of disdain towards the working-class communities already grappling with the cost of living crisis.

    Yusuf pointed out that the provost of UCL is getting paid a salary of more than £250,000 a year, while UCL’s outsourced workforce is paid poverty wages. She said university policies were not in line with its professed principles of anti-racism. According to Yusuf:

    This willingness to discard racialised key workers is another reminder of the ways that UCL repeatedly betrays its professed principles of anti-racism and equality.

    IWGB’s Universities of London branch is collecting money to support the security workers’ struggle. You can donate to its strike fund here.

    Featured image via IWGB Union

    By Tom Anderson

  • Palestinian organisation calls for sanctions on Israel over Jenin attack

    Israel’s military has launched its biggest attack on a city in the West Bank since the second Palestinian uprising (or ‘intifada’) in the 2000s. Israeli troops have been attacking the city of Jenin since the early hours of Monday 3 July. The Israeli army had killed ten Palestinians as of Tuesday 4 July at 2pm BST.

    The attack is the latest in a series of murderous Israeli raids on Jenin. The Israeli army has now given their offensive a name, ‘Operation Home and Garden’.

    Israeli forces have been met with strong resistance from people in Jenin. Palestinian journalist Ali Abunimah told Al Jazeera:

    Jenin has been consistently a centre of armed resistance against the occupation, you can say a thorn in the side of the occupiers.

    He continued, commenting on the strength of Jenin’s resistance:

    What we are seeing – and which is of course very heartening – is stiff resistance from the resistance in the camp.

    In Abunimah’s opinion:

    That’s extremely good news for the people of Jenin and the people of Palestine generally, to see the resistance fighting back so strongly against this invasion force.

    Israeli military orders camp residents to leave

    On the night of 3 July, Israeli soldiers ordered residents of Jenin refugee camp to leave. Palestinian legal advocacy organisation Al Haq reported that camp residents were given just two hours to evacuate their homes:

    Social media footage shows camp residents fleeing their homes, flanked by heavily armoured vehicles.

    Many commentators have warned of history repeating itself. Israeli forces carried out a massacre in the Jenin refugee camp in 2002, and levelled homes using the same Caterpillar D9 military bulldozers that Israeli forces deployed on 3 July. Several camp residents were crushed to death under the rubble of their homes during the 2002 invasion.

    Increased use of heavy weaponry

    As well as military bulldozers, the Israeli military has used armed drones in its attack on Jenin.

    Drone strikes have been a regular Israeli tactic in the besieged Gaza Strip since the late 2000s. However, the Israeli military has predominantly only used them for surveillance in the West Bank. The Israeli army has reportedly not carried out a drone strike in the West Bank since 2006.

    The use of heavy weaponry in general in the West Bank has been steadily increasing. Israeli pilots used Apache helicopters to fire missiles during the last full-scale raid on Jenin in June. It was the first time missiles had been fired from Apaches in the West Bank in 20 years.

    Far-right Israeli politicians have been pressuring the army to increase its use of violence in the West Bank. On 19 June, Israel’s extreme right-wing finance minister called for the military to use airpower and armoured forces in West Bank cities.

    Demand for sanctions

    Palestinian organisations have been calling on the US, EU, and other states to place military sanctions on Israel for decades. Yesterday, Al Haq renewed these demands. The organisation, which was itself made illegal by the Israeli state last year, made this statement via Twitter:

    It’s high time to impose sanctions and an arms embargo on Israel. It’s high time to address the root causes of the Palestinian struggle: denial of self-determination, settler-colonialism, apartheid, and illegal occupation. Hold Israel accountable, demand justice.

    The mainstream media has minimised and sanitised the brutal Israeli attack on Jenin as just the latest round of ‘bloodletting’. Similarly Volker Türk of the United Nations said the violence was ‘spiralling out of control’. But as Abunimah pointed out to Al Jazeera, this makes what is happening seem like a natural disaster that no one can do anything about. He says that the reality is the opposite. The violence is spiralling ‘in control’. What is happening is being tightly controlled by the Israeli state.

    The Israeli state knows exactly what it is doing by escalating the use of force in Jenin refugee camp. It is deliberately creating a more violent situation, in order to stamp out any resistance to its colonisation of the West Bank.

    Palestinians have been calling for years for states to take action to stop Israel’s war crimes against them. In general, international leaders don’t listen. However, when people around the world have united in support of the Palestinian anti-colonial struggle we have won successes. The Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement has won a series of important battles against state and corporate complicity in Israel’s occupation policies.

    Just recently, multinational company G4S pulled out of its final contracts with the Israeli police, after an international struggle of more than a decade. That struggle was participated in by people all over the world. These victories raise the morale of our comrades in Palestine, and show that Palestinians are not alone.

    This week’s escalation of Israeli state aggression should be a wake-up call that we need to redouble our solidarity efforts. We need to show clearly that we share the grief for those killed in Jenin, and that we will stand with the Palestinian people against this new phase of colonial violence.

    Featured image via Screenshot / Al Jazeera

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Israel has approved a massive new colonisation of the West Bank

    The Israeli state approved the construction of over 5,623 new housing units in the West Bank this week, in an escalation of its colonisation. The United Nations (UN) has condemned the move.

    Israeli forces have illegally occupied the West Bank since 1967. They have been colonising it ever since. At least 620,000 Israeli settlers live in over 200 illegal settlements in the occupied territory.

    Last week, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave extreme right-winger Bezalel Smotrich sole control of the approval of new settlements. Smotrich has already announced his intention to double the number of settlements within the next few years.

    It’s clear that this new wave of colonisation will be facilitated by a ramping up of military repression. Smotrich has publicly denied the existence of Palestinians as a people, and last week he called for the use of airpower and heavy weaponry in West Bank cities.

    Military force is already escalating. Israeli forces fired missiles from helicopter gunships in the city of Jenin last week. This was the first time this type of weaponry had been used in the West Bank for twenty years.

    Working hand-in-hand with the colonists

    Settler violence continued last week in the West Bank following a Palestinian resistance attack on the settlement of Eli, which killed four settlers. The Palestinian attack was in response to the deadly Israeli raid on Jenin, which killed seven Palestinians.

    The Israeli army stood by and watched as the violence against Palestinian civilians escalated. Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem pointed out that this is part of a systematic Israeli state policy. It tweeted:

    These events are not a single, isolated failure of the military or state, but a clear expression of Israel’s policy in the OpT [Occupied Palestinian Territories]. As part of this policy, Israel arms gangs of settlers and allows and even encourages them to attack Palestinians.

    B’Tselem gave a detailed description of what happened. It said that, beginning on the afternoon of 20 June, Israeli settlers attacked and burnt homes, cars, and property in Palestinian villages and towns.

    Two of the first places to be attacked by settlers were Huwarra and al-Lubban al-Sharqiyah. When residents tried to stop the attacks, the Israeli army fired at them with rubber-coated steel bullets and live ammunition. Similar incidents occurred in Beitin, al-Lubban al-Gharqiyah, Burqah, Yasuf, Turmusaya, and many other places. B’Tselem commented that:

    These events don’t reflect a single, isolated failure of the military or the state, but rather a clear expression of Israel’s policy in the occupied territories for many years. As part of this policy, Israel arms gangs of settlers and allows, and even encourages them, using inciting language, to attack Palestinians. As if that were not enough, in some of these cases, soldiers and police officers remain idle, assist the attackers or even harm Palestinians who are trying to protect themselves.

    The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) tweeted:

     

    An attempt at a new wave of colonisation

    It’s clear that the approval of these thousands of new settler housing units is a serious threat by the Israeli state. It is a threat that comes alongside a major escalation of Israeli military force in the West Bank, and the encouragement of violence by Israeli settlers.

    Palestinians are calling for solidarity in their anticolonial struggle. You can read more about the Palestinian campaign for Boycott Divestment, and Sanctions against Israeli militarism here. Alternatively, click here to find out about the Palestinian-led ISM, which is calling for international volunteers to join it in Palestine to support the popular grassroots resistance to the occupation.

    Featured image via Wikimedia Commons/Justin McIntosh, resized to 770×403 under license CC BY 2.0

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Surge in anti-LGBTQ disinformation targets Pride in Europe

    As Pride events got underway in Europe in June, disinformation and hate speech targeting the LGBTQ community has spread across social media. This has in turn triggered extreme online responses, including incitements to violence.

    Advocacy groups across Europe said the deluge of toxic content online is part of an overall trend of rising anti-LGBTQ sentiment worldwide. But, they noted that the community is coming under particular pressure during public events. Namely, Pride events taking place around the world. 

    Rise in violence

    The surge in online disinformation and vitriol is all the more worrying after a spate of violence during Pride events last summer in Europe.

    One social media post in Polish falsely stating that the army would create “LGBT units” was shared across Telegram, Twitter, and Facebook in Serbia. Some social media users commented that the new soldiers should be “burned at the stake”, while others praised Hitler’s persecution of gay men.

    Another false claim, that the Arc de Triomphe in Paris had been turned into a rainbow art installation, went viral in multiple European languages. Facebook users responded with slurs. One person even called for LGBTQ people to be burned and executed.

    In Hungary government and pro-government media personalities often use anti-LGBTQ rhetoric. Such figures referred to Pride celebrations online with derogatory homophobic slurs.

    Smears

    Posts in Finnish and Croatian either missed or deliberately ignored the satirical nature of a book for adults by Canadian comedian, Brad Gosse. They falsely claimed it was “promoting sex to children” as part of a trans-rights campaign. Gosse quipped on Twitter.

    Campaigners say that the wave of false claims and hate speech is part of an increasingly violent public discourse against LGBTQ people.

    Some European countries – such as Spain, Slovenia, and Moldova – have adopted new legislation protecting LGBTQ rights. But a recent report by the Brussels-based ILGA-Europe (International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association) found that: 

    the public discourse is becoming more polarised and violent, particularly against trans people.

    A May 2023 European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) report said anti-LGBTQ misinformation and disinformation was particularly prolific and. The report said that it:

    often incites hate against minorities, laws and institutions.

    ‘The same tune’

    While some anti-LGBTQ false claims shared on social media in Europe in June first appeared in the United States, others originated in Russia.

    Agence France-Presse (AFP) fact-checkers found that the video claiming to show Polish public television reporting that the country’s army would open “LGBT units” was first shared on Russian propaganda channels in January. Jakob Svensson, a professor of media and communication science at Malmo University, told (AFP):

    Russia and the US far-right are playing the same tune.

    Svensson’s research highlights that global actors are framing the passing of progressive laws as an attack on “traditional values”. The same actors see the simple visibility of the LGBTQ community as part of the same ‘attack’. Such disinformation campaigns feed into European narratives. False social media claims about trans athletes filtered from the US to Europe in 2023. A European far-right politician spread them even further.

    Researchers and campaigners say a lack of sufficient moderation on social media platforms exacerbates the problem. Aleksandra Gavrilovic is the programme coordinator for the Serbian NGO for lesbian human rights, Labris. Gavrilovic told AFP that she feared young people are particularly exposed to “content that is neither verified nor accurate”.

    Svensson added that the lack of consequences for those spreading false claims and hate speech:

    can also embolden anti-LGBTQ activists and bashers who feel impunity to attack

    ‘Hate campaigners and troll farms’

    The spike in anti-LGBTQ rhetoric around Pride events in Europe is part of a global trend.

    Some US Pride celebrations have been scaled back this year, organisers told AFP. This is especially the case in states where politicians want to curtail rights for queer people. 

    The surge in disinformation and hate speech around Pride comes as campaigners highlight how physical attacks against LGBTQ people are rising generally in Europe.

    ILGA-Europe said Europe and Central Asia had seen the “deadliest rise” in attacks in a decade in 2022 when it announced its annual review, a compilation of incident reports from 54 countries.

    Oslo cancelled its yearly Pride parade last year following a fatal shooting at LGBTQ venues. A far-right attacker killed two people in Bratislava in front of an LGBTQ bar last year. Milos Kovacevic – legal empowerment coordinator for Serbia-based NGO Da Se Zna! – told AFP how physical attacks had surged alongside anti-LGBTQ claims online around EuroPride in Belgrade last September. He said:

    Half of the incidents we registered in 2022 happened in August and September.

    The leap from online slurs to real-life danger is at the forefront of campaigners’ minds. Remy Bonny is the executive director of EU-wide LGBTQ advocacy group Forbidden Colours. He told AFP how he was targeted online by “hate campaigners and troll farms” earlier this year for trying to convince EU members to join a lawsuit against anti-LGBTQ laws in Hungary.

    The director of Hungary’s government-backed Center for Fundamental Rights tweeted that Bonny would not be allowed “near Hungarian children”. AFP found dozens of tweets in English from Twitter accounts with Hungarian usernames calling Bonny and LGBTQ people sexual predators. Bonny told AFP:

    Everybody knows how dangerous it can be to publicly call someone a ‘groomer’ or ‘paedophile’ without any evidence. This jeopardises my personal security.

    Pride began with a riot against bigotry

    With hate-speech and disinformation against LGBTQ people on the rise, its all the more important to support grassroots pride events in our communities. Corporate sponsors, keen to monetise the event, are increasingly robbing mainstream Pride events of their radical edge. Added to this, opportunistic pinkwashing from politicians and police forces denigrate the event. Instead, our communities must remember how Pride started, with a riot against bigotry and injustice. Let’s keep that radicalism in mind this year, as we should every year.

    Via Agence-France Presse, additional reporting by Tom Anderson

    By Tom Anderson

  • Calls for solidarity, as Turkish drones assassinate members of the Kurdish women’s movement

    The Turkish military assassinated Yusra Darwish, the co-chair of Qamişlo canton council in Northeast Syria, on 20th June. Missiles fired from a Turkish drone killed Yusra, who was also a prominent member of the Kurdish women’s movement.

    A revolution has been underway in Rojava, Northeast Syria since 2012, based on the ideas of women’s freedom, grassroots democracy, and an ecological society. The Turkish state is opposed to this revolution, and has been trying to destroy it since it began.

    The drone strike also killed Leyman Shiweish, Yusra’s deputy co-chair, and the driver of the car, Farat Touma. Thousands of people attended their funeral in Qamişlo.

    Rojava’s Democratic Union Party (PYD) said that Leyman was one of the first women to join the Kurdistan revolution, and that she spent 38 years fighting as a guerilla in the Kurdish mountains. They concluded:

    The enemy should know that the struggle started by comrade Rihan [Leyman] will continue at any cost.

    ‘Our answer will be the women’s revolution’

    This is by no means the first time the Turkish state has used assassination attacks against the Kurdish women’s movement. Zehra Berkel, Hebûn Mele Xelîl, and Emina Weysi were members of the Kongreya Star women’s federation. The Turkish military murdered them in another drone attack in 2020. Last year Nagîhan Akarsel, co-editor of Jineoloji magazine, was assassinated in an attack on her house in Suleimaniye in Iraqi Kurdistan. Jineoloji carries out decolonial dissemination of knowledge in the social sciences of, by, and for women. It is associated with the ideas of the Kurdish women’s movement. Kongreya Star wrote at the time:

    the Turkish state has persistently tried to weaken the struggle. But the persistence, will and strength of the freedom-loving women will not be weakened or broken. Our answer will be the victory of the women’s revolution all over the world.

    The Turkish state’s attacks on the revolutionary women of the Kurdish Freedom Movement are systematic and long-established. To read Kongra Star’s dossier on the assassinations of their comrades click here.

    UK group condemns the killings

    Kurdistan Solidarity Network (KSN) is a UK group which supports the revolutionary politics of the Kurdish Freedom Movement and the Rojava revolution. KSN Jin, the autonomous women’s structure of the KSN, made the following statement:

    Kurdistan Solidarity Network – Jin condemn these and all other attacks the Turkish state is carrying out in its attempt to destroy, piece by piece, the work of building a democratic, ecological and peaceful future for North and East Syria. We stand with our sisters in Kurdistan and beyond and raise our voices in solidarity, defiance and shared pain. 

    Yusra Darwish joined the Rojava Revolution in 2012 and worked for many years as a teacher, school principal and active member in the field of education. She was elected co-chair of the Amudê Education Committee  before becoming co-chair of the Qamishlo-Canton Council in November 2022.

    KSN Jin went on to speak about Leyman Shiweish:

    Leyman Shiwish

    Leyman Shiweish, who is also known as Reiyhan Amude, has been working for peace, democracy and women’s liberation for years and has played an important role in the women’s revolution in Rojava since it began.

    The statement continued:

    Both women worked tirelessly for social change and the organization of social, community and political activities in the canton since the beginning of the revolution.

    The killings of Yusra, Leyman and Farat are part of a Turkish military campaign of drone strikes and shelling. Turkish drones have killed at least 21 people over the past weeks.

    The European Kurdish Democratic Societies Congress (KCDK-E) have called for international solidarity against Turkish aggression. They said that the Turkish state wants to occupy and ethnically cleanse more of Northeast Syria:

    It is necessary to see that the invading Turkish army has a very serious and clear goal of occupying and dekurdifying the region. It also replaces the Kurdish population by people from other places in the region.

    KCDK-E called for people around the world to stand up against the Turkish attacks. People in Suleimaniye, Brussels, and Bern have already held demonstrations against the attacks. You can follow Kurdistan Solidarity Network to find out about solidarity events in the UK.

    Featured image via Kongra Star

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • ACORN has been winning more victories for tenants across the UK

    Tenants from the ACORN renters union have been winning victories across the UK over the last few weeks. Union branches in Bristol and Brighton have reported successes. What’s more, campaigns are also underway in Cardiff and Birmingham.

    ACORN organiser Nick Ballard tweeted:

    Stop the bidding

    In Bristol, ACORN picketed several branches of lettings agency CJ Hole. ACORN Bristol has been demanding that lettings agencies stop promoting ‘bidding wars’. Agencies have been encouraging prospective tenants to bid against each other, offering over the asking price to rent properties in the city. The branch has gathered 22 pledges from Bristol agencies not to engage in the practice.

    Campaigners reported that CJ Hole, Bristol’s biggest lettings agency, agreed to the union’s demands after ACORN members held demonstrations and stuck ‘wanted posters’ for CJ Hole founder Chris Hill on the windows of its agencies.

    The Canary contacted CJ Hole for comment, but we didn’t receive a reply.

    ACORN Bristol tweeted:

    Forcing landlords to sort out disrepair

    In Brighton, ACORN members occupied the town hall. They were calling on a local landlord to sort out the disrepair of a member’s home. As a result of the protest, the council reportedly issued the landlord with a fine. And this also led to the landlord finally setting a date for the much-needed repairs.

    Campaigning for Public transport

    In Birmingham, ACORN has been campaigning for better transport. The union is campaigning for more public control of buses in Birmingham. According to their online petition:

    Profits are being put before people, and it’s high time that public transportation was run for the public good once again. We live in a region that runs on its buses, they are the lifeblood of the West Midlands and the vast numbers of our residents who rely on them. 30% of households have no access to a car and we deserve better!

    Our members and communities across the West Midlands believe that through bus franchising we can achieve the best possible service through a publicly controlled network, run for the benefit of residents, not simply to maximise profits and dividends.

    ACORN is calling on councillors and the mayor to join its campaign.

    Not standing for theft of deposits

    Meanwhile, in Cardiff, a campaign is underway to get back a union member’s deposit. ACORN Cardiff says that CPS Homes has stolen a deposit from Acorn member Becca.

    The Canary contacted CPS Homes for a comment. A spokesperson for the agency said that Becca’s deposit had been handled by the government-authorised Deposit Protection Scheme (DPS), and DPS had handed them the deposit money.

    However, ACORN Cardiff says that CPS Homes has a history of taking tenants’ deposits. The group has been leafleting outside CPS Homes branches, informing the public of the company’s practices.

    Housing campaigner Penny Dinh, who attended a demo against CPS Homes, tweeted:

    One thing’s for sure: tenants’ unions like ACORN are sorely needed right now. Landlords would walk all over us given half the chance, but when we organise collectively, we have real power.

    Click here to learn more about ACORN and how to join the union. Take a look at Living Rent and London Renters Union websites too, to find out what’s going on in your area.

    Featured image via Unsplash

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Israeli military uses Apaches in Jenin, as far-right minister calls for more air attacks on West Bank cities

    On Monday 19 June, Israeli forces deployed Apache helicopter gunships and carried out airstrikes on the West Bank city of Jenin.

    The Israeli military’s assault on Jenin included snipers and at least 120 armoured vehicles, as well as the air attacks. The Palestinian Red Crescent said that Israeli forces directly attacked ambulances.

    Journalists reporting on the raid also came under fire. Israeli forces shot journalist Hazem Nasser while he was doing his job. Medics rushed him to hospital.

    In total, Palestinian media is reporting that six people died and 100 were injured in the Israeli attack.

    Those killed by Israeli forces include a 15-year-old boy named Ahmed Yousef Saqr.

    Palestinian resistance fighters confronted the attacking Israeli forces with considerable force. They reportedly injured eight Israeli soldiers and targeted military vehicles with explosives.

    Palestinian journalist Rania Zabaneh tweeted:

    The aerial attack was the first of its kind in 20 years in the West Bank.

    Jenin has been suffering increased attacks from Israeli forces since March 2022. However, this is the biggest assault since since 26 January 2023, when Israeli troops killed 10 Palestinians in a deadly raid on Jenin’s refugee camp.

    Palestinian group Stop the Wall called for a military embargo in response to the attack on Jenin. It tweeted:

    Far-right minister threatens more colonial violence

    Later, on 19 June Bezalel Smotrich – the far-right Israeli finance minister – called for the continued use of airpower and armoured vehicles in the West Bank.

    Smotrich said:

    the time has come to utilise air forces and armoured forces.

    He has also previously denied the existence of Palestinians as a people. His threat of increased military force goes alongside Israeli government plans to rapidly increase the rate of colonisation in the West Bank. Smotrich has further pledged to double the number of Israeli settlers in the West Bank in a matter of years.

    On top of this, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu just gave Smotrich’s colonial ambitions the green light by handing him sole control of the approval of new settlements. The Israeli state is already planning 4,000 new settlement housing units.

    Calls for a military embargo

    Many on Israel’s left have responded with dismay. Anti-occupation veterans’ organisation Breaking the Silence tweeted:

    Palestinian group Stop the Wall‘s call for a military embargo was echoed by the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. BDS Movement pointed out the complicity of European company Airbus in arming Israel:

    You can read more about the Palestinian campaign of BDS against Israeli militarism here. Alternatively, click here to find out about the Palestinian-led International Solidarity Movement, which is calling for international volunteers to join it in Palestine to support the popular grassroots resistance to the occupation.

    Featured image via screenshot

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • IWW union wins back Plymouth hospitality worker’s unpaid wages

    Members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) carried out a picket at a Plymouth restaurant last week, calling on bosses to pay the workers properly.

    The radical trade union accused the bosses of the Kickin’ Caribou of withholding wages.

    Bristol IWW tweeted:

    The picket was attended by IWW members from Bristol, Devon, Cornwall and Plymouth.

    The union decided to take action after the managers of the Kickin’ Caribou didn’t respond to a grievance letter.

    Workers lined up outside the restaurant, waved union flags, and chanted:

    Caribou, shame on you! Pay your workers what they’re due!

    The picket went on for nearly an hour, receiving a good deal of attention from customers and passers-by. IWW representatives negotiated with the manager while the picket was underway.

    By the end of the protest, the union had been able to secure almost £400 of unpaid wages.

    ‘Solidarity gets the goods’

    The Canary contacted the owner of the Kickin’ Caribou for a comment. They said that a deduction had been made from the worker’s wages because of the worker quitting mid-shift. However, when faced with a noisy picket, the Kickin’ Caribou quickly agreed to pay back nearly the full reduction in wages.

    Sab, who was acting as a union rep for the IWW, said in a statement:

    At first the managers weren’t even there but when they found out what was happening we called them to come and meet with us, we would wait. By turning up outside the restaurant we showed that we were serious and that we wouldn’t leave with our member empty handed. We would walk the manager to a nearby cashpoint if needed.

    Grey, the worker who had brought the grievance against the Kickin’ Caribou, made the following statement:

    My union rep spoke with the owner on my behalf and we were able to settle on a pretty good agreement.

    We settled on splitting the deductions in half so rather than the £414 owed it would be £370! Hopefully it showed the other staff that if you come together you can overcome!

    I’m so grateful for today, felt very empowering and it was an incredible show of solidarity!

    Grey told the Canary that the experience had impressed on them how important it was to be in a union. They said:

    This experience has really taught me how important it is to be a part of a union. I didn’t think I would ever achieve something so empowering. I was supported the whole time and inspired by how many people showed up to support.
    That part of my life is finally over thanks to the IWW I have a lot more peace of mind and security.

    ‘Hospitality employers think they can take the piss’

    Max, the secretary of Bristol IWW, was also pleased with how the day went. They said:

    It felt really great to come out to support our fellow worker in their dispute and to share a sense of togetherness with the other wobblies [IWW members]. So many hospitality employers think they can take the piss with their employees, but today really showed that solidarity is strength and that we can fight back.

    The IWW concluded their statement by calling on other workers not to tolerate similar behaviour from their bosses:

    Never tolerate wage theft in any form, no matter where you work. Solidarity gets the goods!

    You can read more about IWW here, or click here to find out how to join the union.

    Featured image courtesy of IWW

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • The three people who stopped the 2021 Jamaica deportation flight have been acquitted

    A jury at Lewes Crown Court acquitted three anti-deportation campaigners of causing a public nuisance this week. The three took direct action in November 2021 to stop a deportation flight bound for Jamaica.

    The verdict followed a two-and-a-half weeks long trial.

    Direct action

    In November 2021, the defendants locked-on in the road outside Brook House detention centre at Gatwick airport. Their intention was to stop coaches taking people to Birmingham airport for deportation from leaving.

    SOAS Detainee support tweeted at the time:

    In the end, the state was only able to deport four out of an intended 50 people.

    Their action had far-reaching consequences. Campaigners made a freedom of information request about the 50 people the flight intended to deport. The response, published May 2023, showed that 41 out of the 50 people are still in the UK.

    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) initially charged the three with aggravated trespass. However, the CPS later changed its mind and put them on trial for the potentially more severe offence of causing a public nuisance.

    Buying time

    During the trial, the defendants told the jury about what it’s like inside Brook House detention centre. A recent Panorama undercover investigation exposed the conditions inside the centre.

    They listed to the jury how many of the people scheduled for deportation had been living in the UK since they were children. They also detailed how the Jamaica deportation breached many of the Home Office’s own guidelines.

    The defendants gave evidence that they had intended to delay the deportation vans, in order to create time for last-minute legal challenges by lawyers representing those facing deportation.

    A press release by campaign group Stop Deportations explained:

    This is why direct actions like these buy people life-changing minutes to fight their deportations through the courts.

    Judge rules out evidence of Brook House detainee

    The judge refused to allow the jury to hear evidence from a witness who was being held in Brook House at the time of the action, and who was scheduled to be deported to Jamaica. On top of that, the defendants were not allowed to present expert evidence about the illegality of the deportations.

    Despite all this, the jury finally decided in the defendants’ favour. It found all three not guilty.

    Defence solicitor Hussain Hassan, of Commons Solicitors, commented on the politically charged atmosphere in which the case took place:

    This trial has taken place against a backdrop of increased state repression of those who engage in direct action, not only by legislative changes but also by an increasing tendency by the Crown Prosecution Service to overcharge those alleged to have committed criminal offences in the context of political protest.

    Detainees were resisting too

    The three defendants made a joint statement after the verdict. It read:

    We took action to prevent people from being ripped away from their families, communities and loved ones, and from the places and communities they live [in].

    But it wasn’t just their action that stopped the deportations. People were resisting inside Brook House too. The defendants continued:

    At the same time as we blocked Brook House detention centre, people inside were also resisting deportation. This prosecution was an aggressive attempt by the state to criminalise our act of solidarity.

    Stop Deportations made the following statement:

    The verdict today shows the power of collective action, resistance and solidarity. The actions of the Brook House 3 helped to stop 41 people from being violently torn away from their families.

    The group continued, reaffirming their commitment to resist deportations. They said:

    We will not sit idly by and watch the Home Office deport people to their deaths and away from their lives in the UK, we will continue to resist deportations and the broader hostile environment despite this attempt to intimidate us and deter civil resistance.

    You can follow Stop Deportations here.

    Featured image via London Evening Standard/Facebook screenshot

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Anti-racists target company refitting Cornwall’s controversial prison ship

    Anti-racists have targeted A&P, the company refitting the Bibby Stockholm prison ship. The Tories previously announced they want to use the controversial barge to imprison 500 male refugees off the shores of Falmouth. They also said that more of these floating prison ships are planned.

    The Bibby Stockholm is being refitted in Falmouth, before being moved to Portland Port in Dorset.

    Redecorated

    Anonymous campaigners ‘redecorated’ A&P’s premises in Falmouth with red paint this week. The Canary has, thankfully, not heard any reports of arrests after this direct action.

    Dorset Eye tweeted:

    Campaign group Cornwall Resists has vowed to stop the ship becoming operational. They called for a week of action, culminating in a mass protest on 18 June.

    They celebrated the redecorating of A&P on Twitter:

    Campaigners also held a protest at the docks, close to where the Bibby Stockholm refit was taking place:

    Cornwall Resists pointed out the danger of imprisoning people on ships like the Bibby Stockholm.

    The group reminded us that one person has already died as a result of being detained on the barge. The Dutch government used the ship to lock up asylum seekers in the 2000s. Rachid Abdelsalam suffered heart failure in 2008, and died on board.

    Cornwall Resists maintains that A&P, by refitting the Bibby Stockholm, is complicit in the violence and racism of the border regime:

    A&P are not only complicit in border violence, by working on this floating prison, they are actively perpetrating it. One person has already died on the Bibby Stockholm. How many more people have to be killed before we say enough is enough and take action to prevent it?

    Rachid’s wasn’t the only death aboard the Dutch prison ships. Ahmad Mahmud El Sabah died aboard another Rotterdam detention barge the same year after he suffered an infection of the liver. He was diabetic. Witnesses say that he was only taken to hospital when he collapsed.

    Resistance continues

    Cornwall Resists called on supporters to jam the phonelines of A&P on Wednesday 14 June. At the time of writing, the group is calling on campaigners to drop banners wherever they are in support of the struggle to stop the Bibby Stockholm. On 16 June, campaigners are planning a day of outreach to the workers of A&P, and there’s a mass protest planned for Sunday.

    Find out more about Cornwall Resist’s Week of Resistance here. You can also donate to support their campaign by through this link.

    Featured image via screenshot, YouTube

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • 50 organisations sign a public call for an amnesty for Ely rioters

    Over 50 organisations have signed a letter calling for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to drop the charges against the Ely rioters. Riots broke out on 22 May in Ely, Cardiff, following the deaths of teenagers Kyrees Sullivan and Harvey Evans. 20 people have now been arrested.

    Kyrees and Harvey were killed in a road accident, after police chased them. The two boys had been riding an e-bike. The police initially denied having chased the boys, but CCTV later emerged of a police van following them just before the crash.

    Riots broke out after heavy police presence provoked a crowd of 150 mourners who had gathered after the collision.

    The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) has confirmed that gross misconduct notices have been given to the two police officers who chased Kyrees and Harvey. However, these notices do not necessarily mean that the officers will face disciplinary proceedings.

    Drop the charges

    The Canary Worker’s Co-op has signed the letter, along with over 50 researchers, organisations, and individuals. The signatories include celebrated Hollywood director Boots Riley, Chumbawumba’s Alice Nutter, several academics and organisers, and local community organisations from Cardiff.

    The letter calls for Mark Drakeford, the first minister of Wales, to make a statement seeking an amnesty for the young people. They also call for the CPS to drop the charges. Many of the people under arrest are below the age of 18.

    According to the authors of the letter:

    Handing serious charges to children and young people will impact the course of their whole lives. Going to court or even prison will harm their current and long term mental and physical health, access to work, education, and support, and could see them face up to 10 years in prison, altering their lives forever.

    The authors point out that these are by no means the first deaths at the connected to police in Cardiff in recent years. Mohamud Mohammed Hassan died after being detained at Cardiff Police station in 2021. Leighton Jones died after South Wales Police restrained him the same year.

    Statements of support

    Welsh language publisher Cyhoeddiadau’r Stamp, a signatory organisation, made the following statement in solidarity with the people of Ely:

    We cannot ignore what the community in Ely are going through at this time, and we stand in solidarity with them in their loss. We hope, by signing this open letter, we are adding another voice in support of the calls to prevent further loss from a community which is already experiencing terrible grief, and to prevent further unnecessary harm to the young people there.

    Dr Dan Evans, a lecturer at Cardiff University and another of the signatories, wrote:

    Criminalising these frustrated young people will solve nothing. It will simply perpetuate social exclusion and marginalisation

    An ‘understandable emotional reaction’

    The open letter itself reads:

    Dear Mark Drakeford and the Crown Prosecution Service,

    First of all, we stand with, and send our deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Harvey Evans and Kyrees Sullivan in the wake of this terrible tragedy. The pain of losing these boys so young is unimaginable, and we hope you know that we wish to support you in any way possible as you seek justice.

    The letter points out that the riot was an “understandable emotional reaction” to the actions of South Wales Police:

    The unrest seen in Ely was an understandable emotional reaction to a tragedy that may or may not have been directly caused by the actions of South Wales Police.

    It calls for an amnesty for all those arrested:

    We call for an amnesty for these young people and an end to the criminalisation of the community of Ely in the wake of these riots.

    The lives of the family, friends and wider community of the kids who have lost their lives have been changed forever. There is no way to bring them back.

    There is no need to inflict more suffering on this community by locking up its young people.

    The authors of the letter invite individuals affected by the police repression in Ely to reach out to them at diffrwyscriafol@gmail.com.

    Organisations and individuals can also continue to sign up to the open letter via the same email.

    Read the full letter here.

    Featured image via screenshot / BBC

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Jury acquits protester who defended himself with a captured police riot shield

    A jury in Bristol found Kill the Bill protester Michael Truesdale not guilty on Monday 12 June. The majority verdict found Michael innocent of charges of affray and violent disorder.

    Avon and Somerset Police arrested Michael after the 21 March 2021 uprising against police violence outside Bristol’s Bridewell police station. They accused him of using a captured police riot shield against officers. Michael always maintained that he was acting in self defence.

    Judge Ambrose instructed the jury last week that if they found he was acting to defend himself or others then they should find Michael not guilty of both offences. After more than four hours of deliberations, the jury found that he was, indeed, acting in self defence. Michael was acquitted.

    Michael explained, in evidence last week, why he attended the 21 March protest. He said that the demonstration was:

    in relation to the Police Crime Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Bill [now an Act]. We were there to protest against police powers and police practice, and the murder of Sarah Everard.

    Sarah was murdered by serving police officer Wayne Couzens on 3 March 2021.

    Michael said in evidence that the protest was arguably the most important he’d ever attended, and that the negative effects of the PCSC Act would last the for the rest of his life.

    More than two years of struggle

    Michael wrote a statement on the day of his acquittal. In it, he explained the emotional impact of waiting two years for trial.

    Michael was first arrested a month after the 21 March 2021 protest, and was initially charged with the more serious charge of riot. He wrote:

    That’s it. Not guilty. Over two years I have had to wait for my trial to take place, enduring the anxiety of a possible long prison sentence, watching as one after another the criminal justice system punished fellow protesters for standing up for our rights and each other. I’m finally free from prosecution but what justice have we really had? For me this is far from over.

    Bristol Crown Court has sentenced a total of 35 Kill the Bill protesters to over 110 years in prison between them. Several people are still awaiting trial.

    Last week, the jury heard how police deployed horses against the crowd and struck protesters with their riot shields and batons. Several police witnesses spoke about how, during the evening, the crowd’s ‘mood shifted’. Michael wrote scathingly:

    On the stand, police have regularly described a ‘mood shift’ outside Bridewell after the initial March. They conveniently forget the many unprovoked attacks on protesters over those hours leading up to that apparent shift. The moods changing because you’re hitting people, you idiots! And the more and more people who became direct victims of unprovoked police violence, or who witnessed those acts, the more upset the crowd became.

    ‘Proud’

    Michael explained that, when he saw the police violence against the crowd, he felt he had to intervene:

    I watched with dismay as police lashed out at innocent protesters and I felt I had to intervene to protect people. At first just using my body defensively, but at some point I got hold of a police riot shield and with that I was able to keep the cops back and protect people from their strikes much more effectively. As well as improper baton strikes, the police were using a really violent technique called shield blading against people who were just standing there.

    He further recalled the fact that many people in the crowd were injured or hospitalised.

    Michael also explained, in his own words, how he ended up on trial. He said that he remains proud of what he did:

    It sounds pretty crazy, but I was weirdly calm, and I never went too far. I never tried to harm a police officer, even though all cops are bastards and they were trying to harm us. That’s the way I was brought up, to be non violent, but never to turn a blind eye to the violence of others. I never thought I would actually have to do something like this, but in hindsight it is the proudest moment in my life. I have always felt I have strong principles but it is only when you are challenged that you find out how much you really mean them.

    The police ‘have shown no remorse’

    In his statement, Michael made the point that the police were working under the assumption that protest was illegal under Covid-19 legislation on 21 March. Last week, the court heard evidence that this had been their belief, and that, in fact, the police had been wrong in their interpretation of the law.

    Michael described how the threat of long sentences forced many of the other protesters to plead guilty. He said that this has served to strengthen the police narrative of what happened at Bridewell, and in the ensuing weeks of protest. Michael wrote:

    Under the pressure of even more serious prison sentences and the long drawn out process that wears people down, many have pled guilty to have it over and done with. That is the mission of Avon & Somerset police. To wear us down into submission, and get the guilty [pleas]. To paint a picture of violent protesters that has no bearing with reality.

    This they hope will keep burying the truth; being that during three protests in Bristol over one week in March 2021, Avon & Somerset police made protesting illegal, and then brutally attacked innocent people. They have shown no remorse, offered no apology, not even a hint they could share some blame. Instead, they have spent millions of pounds of public money and wasted vast resources to cover up their abuses, and it is the young passionate people who stood up for the right to protest, and stood up for each other, that are paying for their lies and abuse.

    Michael also reminded us that the police violence did not stop on 21 March. He described witnessing the violent attack on a Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) community demonstration on Tuesday 23 March 2021:

    Lets not forget that this police abuse did not end that night at Bridewell. Immediately, we were demonised by the national and local media. They printed lies from Avon and Somerset police without question, about punctured lungs and broken bones that didn’t exist. Then the police attacked a peaceful small protest on College Green in what has been described by political pundits across the board as ‘revenge policing’.
    Michael said that he watched as police beat protesters, and tore down a memorial for Sarah Everard.
    ‘Escalating police violence’
    He went on to describe another protest outside Bridewell on 26 March 2021. Michael said that police made another unprovoked attack on a crowd of people. He wrote:

    Protesters gathered to protest outside Bridewell once again, in defiance of the escalating police violence and threats. The more violent the police were, the more the protesters felt the need to protest about it. At that protest, there was a real strong sense of wanting to keep things totally peaceful even if the police tried to rile us. People did not want a repeat of the first protest. Everyone was working together to maintain that despite serious violence from the police. The most common chant was ‘peaceful protest’ and everyone was sitting down to show no threat to officers.

    Then they set dogs and horses on us and the previously sitting crowds were forced to flee in panic. I’ll never forget the looks in the eyes of the dogs’ handlers, even wilder than the dogs.

    Michael continued:
    We had nowhere to go. It was a huge crowd and we were being chased down the road next [to] Primark towards the Bear Pit with railings on both sides. It was a large crowd and people were running in fear but there was still people in front of you and nowhere to go. I could feel the dog breathing on my leg and at one point it’s teeth pinged on my trouser leg, and I was just able to pull my leg away before I could be bit.

    ‘Support the brave people imprisoned’

    Michael made the point that the charges of riot, affray, and violent disorder could just as easily be levelled against the cops. He also called for an end to the riot trials, which he termed a ‘witch hunt’:

    It is high time that Avon & Somerset Police and the CPS conclude this witch hunt and allow the city of Bristol to move on from the trauma of their violence. Either subject the police to the same scrutiny as the public, or call an end to Operation Harley and reconsider the sentences handed to protesters so far.

    Until then we will continue to support each other through this horror and we will keep standing up for what is right.

    Finally, Michael called for people to support those in prison by donating to the Anarchist Black Cross crowdfunder:

    If you are able, please donate to Bristol Anarchist Black Cross fund to support the brave people who have been imprisoned after standing up for democracy and each other.
    You can read the Canary‘s account of the trial, and Michael’s evidence, here.
    Featured image via Shoal Collective

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Israeli soldiers shot Palestinian journalist Momen Samreen in the head while he was doing his job

    Israeli forces shot Palestinian journalist Momen Samreen in the head with a live round on Wednesday 7 June. Soldiers also shot fellow journalist Rabea’ Monir in the abdomen with a rubber-coated steel bullet.

    The protective helmet Momen was wearing most probably saved his life. He was also wearing a blue press jacket.

    Mo’men is reportedly in stable condition, but his injury is serious. He suffered a skull fracture and bleeding below the brain.

    Punitive home demolition

    Journalists were present as Israeli forces stormed a Ramallah neighbourhood. The soldiers’ aim was to carry out a punitive demolition of the home of a Palestinian prisoner. The Israeli courts had ordered the destruction of Islam Al-Froukh’s family home. Israeli authorities are accusing Islam of bombing a Jerusalem bus station. The house was home to Islam’s four sisters and his parents, The demolition made them homeless.

    Israeli forces carried out the demolition at dawn on Thursday 8 June. The International Solidarity Movement tweeted this video of the explosion:

    Punitive home demolitions are acts of collective punishment, targeted at the families of those who resist the occupation. Human rights organisation B’tselem explained why they are illegal under international law. It wrote:

    Israel’s policy not only infringes the right to housing, it also breaches one of the most fundamental principles of justice: the prohibition on punishing a person for acts committed by another. The prohibition of collective punishment is especially stringent when the victims are children. The Fourth Geneva absolutely prohibits collective punishment without exception.

    The demolition of Islam’s home was also an act of violence and collective punishment against the other people living in his neighbourhood. The soldiers fired live ammunition, tear gas and rubber bullets as they entered the area. Their actions injured 35 people, two of them seriously.

    Targeting journalists

    The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Information made this statement about the shooting of Momen Samreen:

    the direct targeting of journalists by the Israeli occupation soldiers during the incursion into the city of Ramallah at dawn today is part of the open aggression against Palestinian journalists and a persistent disregard for all laws and treaties that provide protection for journalists during their work.

    Israel’s colonial occupation forces routinely target and kill Palestinian journalists. Last year an Israeli sniper shot dead Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in the West Bank city of Jenin. She was dressed in a helmet and blue jacket emblazoned with the word ‘Press’. The Israeli military said her death was an accident. However, an inquiry by legal advocacy organisation Al-Haq and investigative researchers Forensic Architecture found that Shireen was deliberately targeted.

    Further, in April 2022 the International Federation of Journalists wrote:

    At least 46 journalists have been killed [in Palestine] since 2000 and no one has been held to account.

    Whatever the Israeli military says about the shooting of Momen Samreen should be taken with a large serving of salt. Israel’s police and military have a vested interest in ensuring that the reality of their actions against Palestinian communities aren’t put under the spotlight. It’s no surprise, then, that journalists in the region are under constant threat.

    Featured image via screenshot / Hisham Abu Sahaqra

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Bristol Kill the Bill protester tells court how he used captured police riot shield to defend himself

    A Kill the Bill protester has been on trial in Bristol Crown Court this week. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is accusing Michael Truesdale of using a captured police riot shield during Bristol’s uprising against police violence in 2021.

    Judges at Bristol Crown Court have now sentenced 35 people to prison for the Kill the Bill demonstration outside Bridewell Police Station. They have received over 110 years between them.

    Michael has denied the charges against him, and is defending himself in front of a jury this week.

    Excessive, indiscriminate police violence

    The police’s body-worn cameras captured Michael on film. In the video, he was standing with the shield in what he called “a defensive stance” and using it to push back officers in riot gear. The CPS says that this amounts to violent disorder, a charge carrying a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

    Michael argued that he was acting in self-defence, and in the defence of others. He told the court that he only had the shield for a few minutes, and he was using it:

    to defend other people from shield strikes, from baton strikes, from PAVA [incapacitant] spray – and in the process defend[ing] myself

    Michael said that the police used:

    excessive violent behaviour towards protesters, indiscriminately.

    Michael told the court that he had also seen police striking protesters with bladed shield strikes, and that this is why he needed to act to defend himself. Bladed shield strikes are where a police officer uses the edge of a riot shield to hit somebody.

    Protesting ‘against police powers and police practice’

    Michael explained to the court why he attended the Kill the Bill protest in March 2021. He said that the protest was:

    in relation to the Police Crime Sentencing and Courts Bill [now an Act]. We were there to protest against police powers and police practice, and the murder of Sarah Everard.

    Everard was murdered by serving police officer Wayne Couzens on 3 March 2021.

    Michael said that one of the reasons he had gone was because of the attack on protest. He said:

    There was a lot of concern among anyone who takes part in protest about this. Noisy protests could be shut down

    He continued:

    if you did protest it would entail very close cooperation with the police otherwise it wouldn’t happen. I was really concerned as protest is the only way we have really to make our voices heard.

    Michael said that some of his friends had been brutalised by the police at a vigil for Sarah Everard the previous week. Officers even arrested another of his friends for taking part in the memorial on Clapham Common.

    Michael told the court that police had banned a Bristol vigil for Sarah, planned in the same period as the Clapham Common event, under Covid-19 regulations.

    Protecting others

    Michael joined the Kill the Bill march from College Green on 21 March 2021. He initially hung back when the confrontation started outside Bridewell Police Station. He watched with concern as police on horseback entered the crowd and the confrontation escalated.

    Owen Greenhall, Michael’s defence barrister, showed footage of one of the mounted officers using an overarm baton strike against protesters. This is despite the police’s own guidance clearly stating that batons should not be aimed towards the head.

    The footage also showed police officers repeatedly hitting a woman with a baton

    Later on, Michael said that he felt he needed to intervene when he saw the police attacking another woman. Footage shows officers shoving a woman in red to the floor. She got up and tried to climb a traffic-light pole to escape. Michael said he stepped in to help her, holding an arm out. He said that he was trying keep the police away from her.

    Michael told the court:

    I saw her being pushed over, another officer rugby tackled her. I saw them bashing her with shields, batons and all sorts.

    I could see her being hit with batons, she was climbing the pole, she gave me her water bottle – I was pushing against the pole with one arm, and using the other arm to keep them off her.

    He said:

    It felt at any time the police could charge.

    Shortly afterwards, Michael said that someone in the crowd handed him a police riot shield. He said he used it to defend himself and others, as the police were pushing forward and there was nowhere for the protesters to go.

    According to Michael, the scariest point of the evening was when he was shoved to the floor by a line of riot police who were pushing forward. He said:

    I was forced to one knee by the weight of the police officer and the officers behind him.

    My concerns were that I had seen a lot of bladed strikes being used against people – seeing the shield in that position it seemed it was going to make a bladed strike.

    Michael said he put his hand on the officer’s shield and pulled himself up off the floor.

    Shortly afterward, the police sprayed Michael in the face with PAVA spray, and he was forced to leave the crowd and receive first aid.

    Kill the Bill protest ‘the most important I’ve attended’

    Greenhall, defending Michael, asked why he didn’t leave earlier, when the police violence started. Michael said:

    Whilst it would have been convenient for me to leave, and I would have got less hurt, I wouldn’t have defended those people – when faced with people attacking its important for me to defend them. Its irrelevant that it’s police officers attacking.

    He continued:

    I think it was a very important protest, arguably the most important I’ve attended. The Bill would erode our democracy and have negative effects on us throughout our lives. It was important to stay and stand up for the right to protest.

    The jury are now listening to closing speeches from the defence and the prosecution. They are expected to begin deliberating on a verdict on Friday 9 June.

    People in Bristol are raising funds for those already sentenced. Click here to find out how to write to the people in prison, or donate to their crowdfunder here. 

    Featured image via Shoal Collective

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Rage after Israeli soldier shoots and kills Palestinian toddler Mohammad Tamimi

    On 1 June, an Israeli soldier stationed at a temporary checkpoint shot Haitham Tamimi and his two-and-a-half-year-old son Mohammad with live ammunition. Mohammad died from his wounds days later. His death brings the total number of children killed by Israeli forces to 27 this year alone.

    Haitham and Mohammad were in the village of Nabi Saleh, where they both lived.

    After the shooting, soldiers stormed the village and opened fire on residents. 17-year-old Wissam Al-Tamimi was standing on the roof of his house. He suffered a fractured skull when soldiers shot him with sponge-tipped ammunition. Sponge-tipped rounds are supposedly designed to be non-lethal, but in reality they can cause lethal injuries.

    Bilal Al-Tamimi is a journalist and volunteer with the B’Tselem human rights organisation. Soldiers hit his house repeatedly with live ammunition. Despite the fact that Bilal was wearing a press uniform and helmet, a soldier shot him at close range, breaking his wrist.

    Soldiers injured many other residents with live ammunition and sponge-tipped rounds.

    Two days later, on Saturday 3 June, the army raided homes in Nabi Saleh. The soldiers beat up one young man.

    ‘I want justice’

    The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) is a group working to support Palestinian grassroots resistance to the occupation. Mohammad’s mother told ISM:

    I want justice for my son, and for every person who shot at my husband and son to be held accountable

    Local resident Manal Tamimi explained the motivations for the attacks. She said that the violence of the military goes hand in hand with the intimidation from Israeli settlers:

    The incitement for this attack stems from the settlers’ repeated attempts to intimidate the villagers, with the most recent incident occurring just last week. In light of these distressing events, we urgently call upon the international community to ensure the protection of this small village, with a population not exceeding 650 people.

    She went on to add:

    It is imperative that international humanitarian law and international treaties are upheld, and immediate action is taken to halt the repeated attacks by both the occupation forces and settlers. Over the past decade alone, these aggressions have tragically resulted in the martyrdom of five young individuals from the village.

    Nabi Saleh is famous for its resistance to settlement expansion – and to the occupation in general. It is also one of the villages where women have taken a leading role in organising resistance. The residents have paid a high price for its resistance, as the army constantly invades and harasses the village. Israeli incursions have killed six people from Nabi Saleh since 2011. Mohammad’s death brings that total to seven.

    Mohammad Tamimi’s killing ‘a war crime’

    Ayed Abu Eqtaish, who is the accountability program director at Defence for Children International Palestine, condemned Mohammad’s killing:

    Firing live ammunition indiscriminately in a residential neighborhood where there is no threat to an Israeli soldier’s life is a clear violation of the Israeli military’s own policies

    He continued:

    Unlawful killings of Palestinian children have become the norm as Israeli forces become increasingly empowered to use intentional lethal force in situations that are not justified. This is a war crime with no consequence

    A brutal attack on mourners

    Villagers held a funeral for Mohammad on 6 June. During the funeral, Israeli soldiers invaded the village for the third time since shooting Mohammad. Six people were hospitalised.

    ISM shared a video of the army entering the village after fatally injuring Mohammad. It was recorded by Nariman Tamimi, just before she too was hospitalised after a soldier struck her in the face with his rifle. It is taken from the soldiers’ perspective, and doesn’t show the people being shot at. However, it demonstrates the type of military force that is routinely used by the army in Nabi Saleh, and which is causing deaths in the village:

     

    The people of Nabi Saleh, like in so many villages across Palestine, are steadfastly resisting the Israeli occupation’s constant attacks. They are calling for international solidarity and support.

    One of the organisations that has been supporting the residents’ resistance for years is the Palestinian-led ISM. Find out how to join ISM’s work in Palestine here.

    Featured image via screenshot / Quds News Network

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • German anti-racists sentenced to prison for alleged militant attacks on fascists

    A court in Dresden has sentenced a group of German anti-fascists to prison time, for alleged involvement in a string of militant attacks on the far-right. Lina E received the longest sentence – five years and three months. Antifascists across Germany have been mobilising around Lina’s case, with thousands taking to the streets. After Lina’s arrest people rioted for several days in the eastern city of Leipzig.

    Lina E: prison for “combating Nazis”

    The police say that Lina E was organising an antifascist militant cell, responsible for a string of attacks on the far right in Leipzig. Lina E had been on remand for over a year before the sentencing.

    The court in Dresden gave three other defendants sentences of between two years and five months and three years and three months. The prosecution had charged all of them with either association with, or membership of, a criminal organisation:

    Two of the allegations put forward by prosecutors are of an attack on a neo-Nazi National Democratic Party counsellor by a group of 15 people. The anti-fascists reportedly used batons, hammers and pepper spray in the attack. The second allegation relates to an attack on Cedric S, another neo-Nazi in Leipzig.

    Police in Leipzig arrested Lina after a third action, where anti-fascists destroyed a fascist bar. Police picked up Lina E soon after the event took place.

    There has been widespread outcry about the lack of solid evidence in the case.

    Solidarity

    There has been an outpouring of solidarity for the four comrades from across Germany and across Europe. The Milan anti-fascist assembly made the following statement, commenting on the lack of evidence that was presented within the trial:

    The prosecution of Lina and other antifascists was well orchestrated by judges and lawyers in order to condemn Lina, Dy and Jo at all costs. With the lack of overwhelming evidence, it is clear the repressive mechanism set in motion by the government with the support of the mass media, which aims to demonise any kind of opposition to their liberal, imperialist and racist model.

    They continued by emphasising the need to resist the growth of fascism in Germany and elsewhere:

    Fascism has grown exponentially in recent years in Germany and Europe, with its various parties, movements and violent attacks.

    We do not believe in the justice of the courts and the state, on the contrary we despise it, it is being used against us, and against those who want to fight fascism that discriminates against and intimidates migrants. This is why we believe that fascism cannot be defeated by voting or by the implementation of laws that ‘criminalise’ it. Rather, it is necessary to concretely oppose fascist and police raids, the laws that discriminate against different identities and restrict freedom of movement or choice, and the state that judges and condemns forms of struggle.

    Therefore, we express our utmost and unconditional solidarity with Lina, Dy, Jo and all antifascist comrades who are working against all fascist, racist and sexist prevarications.

    Since the verdicts, demonstrations and riots in solidarity with the imprisoned anti-fascists have occurred. An estimated 800 anti-fascists and other protesters fought back against police in Leipzig over two nights following Lina E’s verdict. People in Cologne, Hamburg, Berlin and Bremen also held solidarity demonstrations.

    Despite the state imprisoning the four comrades including Lina E, the militant anti-racist resistance will carry on. The level of anger that people have shown on the streets over the convictions shows the strength of support for the anti-fascist struggle in Germany.

    Click here to listen to a podcast about the case by Popular Front.

    Featured image via Leonhard Lenz – Wikimedia Commons, cropped to 770×403 under licence CC0 1.0

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Erdoğan’s new presidency has started as it means to go on, with arrests and repression

    On Sunday 28 May, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan won Turkey’s presidential run-offs. His victory came amid allegations of violent intimidation of Kurdish voters and electoral fraud.

    Erdoğan has been in power for over 20 years. He took office as prime minister in 2003, and president in 2014. Since then, hungry for autocratic control, he has pushed for dictatorial powers for the presidency, built himself a $350m palace in Ankara, and replaced over 100 elected mayors in Bakur with state approved appointees. Bakur is the part of Kurdistan within the borders of Turkey. On top of this, Erdoğan has waged a constant war against Turkey’s Kurdish Freedom Movement, with at least 10,000 people currently imprisoned.

    Erdoğan: a presidency built on militarism

    Internationally, Erdoğan has been an expansionist militarist; bombing Iraq and invading and occupying North and East Syria. He has used poison gas against Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) guerillas in Iraq, as well as both chemical and white phosphorous weapons against the people of Rojava. Erdoğan has allied with Daesh (ISIS), and created proxies in Syria such as the Turkish Free Syrian Army. Since the 2018 occupation, Turkey’s allies have plundered Afrin’s economy, and replaced Kurdish residents with pro-Turkish Arabic colonists.

    It should come as no surprise then that Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Al-Nusra), the right-wing Islamist group currently in control of the Syrian city of Idlib, extended congratulations to Erdoğan on the election result.

    During the 2019 invasion of North and East Syria, Turkey and its proxies carried out assassinations, massacres, torture, and rapes. Sadly, now that Erdoğan has won another term a new invasion of North and East Syria is much more likely.

    Erdoğan has also presided over militarist interventions in Libya, and provided military support to Azerbaijan for its conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh too. He has consistently ramped up militarist rhetoric against Greece, as well as using the ongoing refugee crisis and war in Ukraine to his benefit internationally.

    Within Turkey, Erdoğan has played the conservative populist card. He has blamed LGBTQ+ people for the Covid-19 virus. Several of his election campaign statements were deeply homophobic. He is an outspoken misogynist too – in 2021 famously pulling out of the 2011 Istanbul Convention. The convention requires governments to adopt measures to prevent violence against women.

    Unfair presidential election

    Before the 14 May 2023 election, members of the Green Left Party (YSP) in Colemêrg (Hakkari) told the Canary that they expected arrests and repression if Erdoğan won. One YSP member in Hakkari told us:

    If AKP (Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party) wins, we will not be waking up in our beds, we will be waking up in prison.

    YSP ran in the parliamentary election, gaining 63 seats. The party wants to completely change the face of Turkey. Their ambitions go beyond states and parliamentary democracy. They want to rewrite the Turkish constitution, and create radical peoples’ democracy at a grassroots-level across Turkey. YSP chose not to stand a presidential candidate. Instead they advised their supporters to make a tactical vote for the Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, in the hope of finally unseating Erdoğan.

    Kurdish voters faced violence and intimidation at polling booths for the second time in a month on May 28. Medya News wrote:

    The Kurdish-majority regions witnessed significant support for opposition candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu in the presidential run-off vote, just as in the first round of elections. However, reports have emerged of supporters and representatives of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and their extremist Islamist partner HÜDA-PAR interfering with voters and observers, particularly in areas where Kılıçdaroğlu had garnered significant support in the first round. The presence of an increased military mobilisation in the region further heightened tensions and uncertainty surrounding the elections.

    Observers from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) criticised the election process. They said that there was an “unfair playing field” for both rounds of elections in May. They reported:

    biased media coverage and the lack of a level playing field gave an unjustified advantage to the incumbent [Erdoğan].

    Arrests and torture

    Since 28 May’s run-off election, a wave of arrests of Kurdish Freedom Movement figures is already underway. On Monday 29 May, Special Operation Police carried out raids, kicking in doors, breaking windows, and assaulting people in Colemêrg in the far southeast. They kicked and punched detainees, and struck them with the butts of rifles.

    Lawyers for Freedom reported that one detainee was tortured for two hours by the Special Operation Police. Police detained Mustafa Bor in Gever (Yüksekova in Turkish). The local hospital treated Mustafa for fractures, severe bruising, and bleeding later that day.

    Meanwhile, in the city of Batman, police arrested 20 people for making a hand gesture associated with the Kurdish Freedom Movement during a victory parade for Erdoğan. They even arrested a journalist for reporting the incident.

    The repression follows a wave of pre-election arrests across Bakur and Turkey. At least 180 people were arrested prior to 28 May’s run-off election, including many YSP members.

    The ‘spirit is still alive’

    Vala Francis is an internationalist who has observed both elections as part of an international delegation called for by the People’s Democratic Party (HDP). After 28 May’s run-off election, she warned of more arrests to come:

    Everyone expects masses of arrests to begin in the next months, especially for all the election work. But also a more general crackdown; literally thousands of people already have ongoing political cases. It’s really a critical time to think of ways to help people practically, on the ground.

    But Vala still sees great hope in the spirit of the people. She wrote:

    The war is deeply psychological. Maybe it doesn’t seem obvious from the outside, but people resist on every front. Some people seem to have a spring inside of them, like water that emerges from the ground. It doesn’t stop. It makes everything in its path clear and luscious for new possibilities. This spirit is still alive, even if by necessity it mostly exists in the shadows. All parts of Kurdistan are connected, and the strengths, and the struggles, and the weaknesses in one part feeds into and is substantiated by every other.

    ‘I don’t feel defeated’

    Vala’s faith in the spirit of the movement is borne out by her recent interview with Ceylan Akça of the YSP. Ceylan was elected to the Turkish parliament on 14 May. Responding to Erdoğan‘s victory, Ceylan said:

    I don’t feel defeated. Of course people are digesting the results now, that maybe there’s another five years with Erdogan. It’s okay to feel sad, to feel discouraged. But just after we get through that feeling, that’s when its time to get back to work. We will work to strengthen our local offices. Everyone here has a court case – they have at least six years of prison sentence dangling over their heads, and yet they still come and work. And we will make sure that we will protect and defend everything that we have accomplished in the last two decades, and in the time before – we will hold onto this, defend this, and we will build on it.

    She quipped:

    This authoritarian system wasn’t built over night, so it wont take a single night to get rid of it. But we’re almost halfway done, if we keep on working on this and fighting for this.

    One thing is clear, and that is the struggle for people’s democracy, and against Erdoğan‘s militaristic, dictatorial rule, is far from over. People will re-organise and renew the struggle on fresh fronts. The revolutionary movement that is challenging Turkish fascism is an internationalist one. Those of us who support the fight for radical democracy in Turkey need to be ready to stand with our comrades in whatever way we can, because the next months and years are going to be a hard fought struggle.

    Featured image via Screenshot/YouTube

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Three internationalists died defending Bakhmut, here’s why they joined the struggle against Russia’s invasion

    Finbar Cafferkey, Dmytro Petrov, and Cooper Andrews were revolutionaries from Ireland, Russia, and the US. All three of them joined the military defence of Ukraine, against Russian aggression. All three of them fell together on 19 April during the Russian offensive against Bakhmut.

    It’s a sad fact that parts of the European left have shown little solidarity with the people of Ukraine, instead making apologies for Russian militarism and colonialism.

    Finbar, Dmitry, and Cooper’s sacrifice should remind us what it means to be a revolutionary, and to support struggles against oppression everywhere.

    Supporting anti-authoritarian resistance against Russia

    Solidarity Collectives (SC) is an organisation supporting around 100 anti-authoritarian comrades fighting against the Russian invasion. When the Canary spoke to Anton, a member of SC about their work, they said:

    our work is related to the logistics to bring them all that is needed and that the army could not provide, to assure their safety as well as their effectiveness in combat. Our work consists as well in supporting relatives and comrades affected by the war, meaning if one comrade gets killed or injured in combat, we would help economically and in any form of support we could provide. Our work continues with the care to relatives in [their] understanding of the engagement of the comrades, sometimes with explaining the choices of the comrades.

    SC has published statements about each of the three fallen internationalists so that people can remember them and understand their struggles better.

    Finbar Cafferkey: From County Mayo, to Raqqa, to Bakhmut

    Finbar Cafferkey, and a comrade

    Finbar Cafferkey was from Ireland. He was involved in the eco-defence campaign against Shell’s natural gas pipeline in County Mayo in the mid-2000s. Later, he volunteered to help defend the Rojava revolution in North and East Syria, and participated in the liberation of Raqqa from Daesh (ISIS) in 2017. Finbar went on to participate in Rojava‘s armed defence against the Turkish invasion of Afrin in 2018 as part of the YPG (People’s Defence Units). He was given the name Çîya, meaning ‘mountain’, by his Kurdish comrades.

    When Russia invaded Ukraine, Finbar began to organise support. He worked with ACK Galicja and the XVX Tacticaid to bring humanitarian support from Poland to the front lines in Ukraine comrades said:

    When asked why he did that, Çîya always answered: “Because I have time and I can be useful here.”

    Later he decided to join a fighting unit with three comrades, supported by SC. According to SC’s statement:

    Finbar taught others to look, listen, and learn carefully – and valued seeing with one’s own eyes. He moved easily through a complex world, comfortably with different people, competently in difficult situations, and calmly amid chaos.

    They continued:

    With his character, he defended the coasts of his homeland from pillaging corporations. With his understanding, he fought in the battle for Raqqa and showed compassion to everyone he met in the Rojava Revolution against Daesh and the Turkish regime. With his commitment, he embraced and served the Ukrainian resistance as it is.

    Finbar’s comrades in the anti-Shell struggle posted a recording of him singing his rebel song about the campaign to defend County Mayo, which you can listen to here.

    Cooper Andrews: ‘there is a world to win and a fight which requires great sacrifice’

    Cooper Andrews, aka Harris, became politicised at a young age. He soon became involved in struggles as a Black autonomist, organising against the police murders of Tamir Rice & Tanisha Anderson. Cooper was also involved in anti-fascism, mutual aid organising, and self-defence training.

    Cooper believed passionately in self-defence. He joined the US Marines to gain the skills he would need as an internationalist fighter. Then, in March 2022, he joined with other anti-authoritarians in the struggle against the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

    Cooper wrote a letter to his comrades a month before he died in Bakhmut. It said:

    In our hands there is a world to win and a fight which requires great sacrifice. For us and everybody else who faces the shadow of fascist aggression, there is only victory or death. Love and struggle.

    SC wrote:

    Before he departed he had conversations about Spain and fascism and history, and he made it clear that he was going to Ukraine because of the humanitarian needs of the people there to his mother.

    Willow Andrews, Cooper’s mother, wants to carry on his legacy. She has set up a memorial fund to support the causes he was passionate about. The money will go to several mutual aid projects in Cleveland. You can donate to the fund here.

    Dmytro Petrov: Russian anarchist fighter against Putin’s invasion

    Dmytro Petrov

    Dmytro Petrov, aka Illia Leshyi, was a Russian anarchist. He was active in protests in Russia, in particular the Bolotnaya Square protests against Putin a decade ago. He also organised militant direct action against the state, and in 2014 he supported the mass protests in Kyiv’s Maidan.

    SC wrote:

    He participated in the defense of the Bitsa Park in Moskow, in “Food not bombs”, fought against infill development and against building of incinerators, for the rights of workers in the ranks of the Anarchist union MPST and against police brutality.

    He participated in the antifascist movement and fought Nazis on the streets of Moscow and other places.

    In 2014 Dmytro decided to join and learn from the Rojava revolution. His comrades wrote:

    As [a] revolutionary, Dima was internationalist. He fought against the atrocity of oppression everywhere he saw it, borders did not stop him. Besides activities in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus he went to Rojava and trained there, took part in the liberation struggle of the Kurdish people.

    Dmytro was one of the founders of the Combat Organization of Anarcho-Communists (BOAK). BOAK has carried out widespread sabotage operations in opposition to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. One of their focuses has been disabling train lines and other infrastructure inside Russia.

    Dmytro realised that it was too dangerous to stay in Russia, and he moved to Kyiv. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he joined the military resistance. He gave interviews where he called on leftists from all over the world to support the struggle of Ukrainian people. Before he died, he was trying to organise an anti-authoritarian fighting unit.

    SC made this statement about Dmytro:

    Leshyi always rejected any kind of nationalism, he based his actions solely on anti-authoritarian values and ideals. And his personal qualities immediately made everyone fall in love with him, even those who had nothing to do with anarchism.

    They continued:

    Today everyone is remembering Dmytro. He is really impossible to forget. But we also encourage you not to forget his legacy. The ideas he believed in. Never give in to the mainstream and always be on the side of the oppressed against the oppressors.

    Call for international solidarity

    You can watch a video that Dmytro recorded in February 2023 here. In his video, Dmytro stresses:

    We are here neither to defend any neoliberal policies or any state structures. We are here to defend this society which defends itself against the aggression, and against elimination and enslavement. Are we tired, of course yes! We are exhausted by this year, but still we think that we are obliged to gather all the forces that we have to continue this struggle, and we also call you to combine your forces together to support us.

    The deaths of Finbar, Cooper, and Dmytro in Bakhmut are a huge loss for anti-authoritarians everywhere. Their memory and their revolutionary spirit should be treasured by all of us. All three of them were people who fought in many different ways against oppression, for liberation, and in defence of the natural world. Their internationalist spirit shows how strong we can be as revolutionaries, and how our struggles for freedom are intertwined globally.

    Their deaths are a devastating blow, but their ideas, dedication, and commitment are a legacy which will inspire many more to continue fighting.

    Featured image via Solidarity Collectives (with permission)

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Riots break out in Cardiff after two teenagers died following apparent police chase

    Anger poured out onto the streets of Ely, Cardiff on the night of Monday 22 May after two teenagers died in a collision on the road. The boys have been named as Harvey Evans, 15, and Kyrees Sullivan, 16.

    Alun Michael, the Police and Crime Commissioner in South Wales, initiallly denied widespread community accusations that a police chase caused the teenagers’ deaths. He told the Independent on 23 May that:

    It would appear that there were rumours, and those rumours became rife, of a police chase, which wasn’t the case…

    However, later that same day, evidence started to emerge that the police’s account of events in Ely was untrue. CCTV showed two people on an electric bicycle being followed by the police just before 6pm, moments before the crash took place.

    Despite the CCTV footage, Michael continued to insist that the boys weren’t chased. He repeated his claim on the morning of 24 May on Radio Wales Breakfast. Then, at around 11am, he conceded that there was a “possibility” of a chase.

    Provocation

    Confrontations with the police broke out in Ely after a 100-150 strong crowd gathered to mourn the boys. A clear story emerged on Twitter that the heavy police presence provoked the mourning crowd, and that officers assaulted people:

    At least fifteen police vehicles were on the scene by just after 9pm. Officers appeared in riot gear, and deployed dogs and surveillance drones.

    By the end of the night, vehicles had been set on fire. Police officers charged the crowd on several occasions, and deployed horses. The crowd fought back, throwing bottles and cans at the police.

    John Urquhart, who witnessed events unfold, took matters into their own hands and brought water and medical assistance to the crowd. They also handed out masks. In one of their last tweets of the night, they expressed anger at what had happened:

    Some local people’s property was damaged, including cars. Campaign group Anarchist Federation urged people to not let this break their community solidarity:

    Cops lie

    Commissioner Michael’s backtracking regarding police involvement is by no means an isolated incident, either. The force often put out false statements after they have caused people’s deaths. To give just one example, Territorial Support Group (TSG) officer Simon Harwood killed newspaper seller Ian Tomlinson in 2009.

    Police initially said that Ian had died from existing health conditions, and that his family had said they were “not surprised” by his death. The Met closed ranks, getting a tame pathologist to do the autopsy. Disgraced pathologist Freddy Patel said that Ian had died of a heart attack. He was later discredited, and struck off the register of forensic pathologists.

    Video footage of the incident showed that Ian had been a bystander at the G20 protests, and had been struck from behind by PC Harwood, causing his death. He’d done nothing to provoke the TSG.

    What happened in Ely should remind us that we should take police statements with a generous helping of salt. We should also see the riot in Ely for what it was – an expression of grief over the deaths, and an outpouring of community anger against the police.

    An expression of grief and rage

    Back in 2021, another confrontation with the police broke out in Mayhill, in nearby Swansea. A confrontation with the police took place at a vigil for local teenager Ethan Powell. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) threw the book at those who got arrested, charging 27 people. 18 adults convicted got a total of 83 years in prison. The CPS charged the Mayhill defendants with riot, which is the most serious public order charge in English law, carrying a maximum sentence of ten years in prison.

    Similarly, 35 people have been jailed for a total of 112.5 years so far after a 2021 anti-police uprising in Bristol. The vast majority of them were initially charged with riot.

    Bristol Anti-Repression Campaign (BARC), which consists of some of those who were arrested in Bristol, as well as their supporters, sent a message of solidarity to the community of Ely. The group said:

    In the classic deceiving and manipulative nature of the police, they have openly and confidently lied about their involvement, and the media has lapped up their story, condemning those who took to the street in rightful anger, diverting people’s attention from the truth.

    We hope that people will see that this is not an isolated incident but that this has happened time and time again. We think of Mark Duggan, we think of Cynthia Jarret, we think of Chris Kaba; our thoughts go out to all of those families too at this time. The police, and only the police are to blame for every part of this incident.

    BARC continued:

    Our hearts are truly shaken and we can’t begin to know how those close to the community feel at this time. We hope that the community can find strength and not allow the cowardliness of the police or the deception of the media to shake them.

    Community self-defence

    Riot has previously been a seldom-used charge. For example, the CPS charged the 2011 UK riot defendants with less serious offences. But in the current political climate, there is a serious chance that the CPS could charge the people arrested in Ely on Monday night with rioting.

    The courts will do whatever they can to criminalise and imprison those who stood up to the police in Ely. Community self-defence doesn’t end with confronting the police on the streets; it also means supporting those arrested. If events follow a similar course to those in Mayhill and Bristol, then the people of Ely are going to need our solidarity and support.

    Featured image via BBC/Screenshot

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Bristol Kill the Bill protester who was kicked and beaten by the police is sentenced to prison

    Richard Fox was savagely beaten by police officers on 21 March 2021, after he had fallen to the ground. Footage seen by the court showed Richard being kicked repeatedly while lying prostrate on the road. On Monday 22 May, Bristol Crown Court sentenced him to 2.5 years in prison, after he accepted a plea to violent disorder.

    Richard is one of several defendants who have accepted plea bargains this month, rather than take the risk of going to trial. Defendants get time off their sentences for guilty pleas, while those who are found guilty after a trial are often given oppressively long sentences.

    Plea bargains are where the Crown Prosecution Service offers to drop the more serious charge, in return for a guilty plea to a lesser charge. In a ‘criminal justice system’ with no justice, plea bargains can often be the lesser of two evils for those in court. Richard had originally been charged with riot, which carries double the maximum sentence to violent disorder.

    The assault by the officers happened outside Bristol’s Bridewell police station, during the 2021 Kill the Bill demonstration.

    A response to police violence

    The 21 March demonstration was in response to the Tory government’s push to introduce the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Bill (which has now been passed). The PCSC Act criminalises many forms of protest, and is a direct attack on the lives of Travelling people.

    The protest also happened in the context of the rape and murder of Sarah Everard by serving police officer Wayne Couzens. On top of that, Mouayed Bashir and Mohamud Mohammed Hassan had died after being in police custody in Newport and Cardiff earlier that year.

    When the demonstration reached Bristol’s Castle Park, protesters gave a speech over a megaphone, suggesting that the march continue on to Bridewell police station to protest what one of them described as “the encroachment of the police state into our lives”. However, when the protesters reached Bridewell, police officers attacked them. Cops deployed batons, dogs, and horses, and repeatedly used their shields as weapons against the crowd.

    Richard Fox was in the crowd outside Bridewell. In many of the Bristol ‘riot’ cases, defence lawyers provided the court with a compilation of video footage showing the police violence on 21 March 2021. The footage shows that officers repeatedly kicked Richard. Cops also struck him with batons, and brought a police riot shield down on his head.

    Richard’s sentencing comes on top of the 4.5 years of prison time handed to Daniel Ellis last week. It brings the total number of people sent to prison for the Bristol uprising to 35. Bristol Crown Court has now handed them a total of more than 112.5 years altogether.

    The courts cannot break our solidarity

    Bristol Anti Repression Campaign (BARC) is one of the groups organising political support and solidarity for the people in court. They made the following statement:

    Danny, pleading to riot and arson against a police vehicle, was given a heavy 4.5 year prison sentence by Judge Patrick. And Foxy [Richard Fox], pleading to violent disorder, was given 2.5 years.
    We’re sending them both so much love and solidarity.
    Leah Brenchley and Carmen Fitchett were also in court last week. Judge Patrick gave them both suspended sentences. BARC explained:
    With our hearts heavy over long prison sentence, we are happy to announce that Carmen and Leah were both handed suspended sentences (10 month suspended for Carmen for affray, two month suspended for Leah for criminal damage and assaulting an emergency worker).
     
    Both have been given two months on tag with curfew, and have to do unpaid work. The violence of the carceral state stretches out well beyond the prison walls, and we recognise that surveillance technologies (like electronic monitoring) extend the reach of that violence even further.
    The group concluded:
    We will never let our comrades go down quiet and alone. Thank you to all the defendants’ friends and families for their support, as well as Bristol Defendant Solidarity (BDS) and Anarchist Black Cross (ABC) for their amazing solidarity work.

    ‘Shocked and disgusted’

    Justice for Bristol Protesters (JBP), a group organised by the families and friends of the Bristol uprising defendants, sent the Canary some reflections on the sentencings over the past weeks.
    Jackie Ellis, mother of Daniel Ellis, said:
    I am totally shocked and disgusted at the sentence my son Danny received on Friday. It is totally out of proportion to other non riot-related sentences that people receive for far worst crimes. The judge even admitted he didn’t do anything really violent and then sentenced him to four and a half years. It is an unbelievable sentence for a young person without a criminal record who got caught up in a peaceful protest that went wrong. My family feels totally failed by a justice system that is not fit for purpose.
    Cathy, mother of Carmen Fitchett, added that:
    We have waited more than two years from charge to sentencing and the wait has been horrible, the numerous delays leaving us feeling completely powerless and frustrated. The whole Criminal Justice system seems designed to disempower, confuse and exclude. If it wasn’t for the solidarity, support and guidance BDS/JBP have offered, the process would have been even worse. I have been stunned by the harsh and obviously politicised sentences handed out to young people for daring to stand up for the right to protest; having seen footage, and heard from people who were there, about how the police behaved that day, the Crown Prosecution Service’s response to our children is doubly twisted. 

    People in Bristol are raising funds for those sentenced. Click here to find out how to write to the people in prison, or donate to their crowdfunder here. 

    Featured image via Bristol Anti-Repression Campaign

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Luke Brooks died after the council failed to order his landlord to remove mould from his home

    A Manchester coroner has ordered an inquest into the death of Luke Brooks. Luke died after developing breathing difficulties linked to his “heavily mould-infested” rented accommodation.

    Luke lived in Oldham, not so far away from the Rochdale social housing flat where two-year-old Awaab Ishak died after prolonged exposure to black mould, as a coroner’s court recently ruled.

    London Renters’ Union tweeted a stark message:

    Coroner Joanne Kearsley – who recently presided over Awaab Ishak’s inquest – ruled that there should be an investigation into Luke Brooks’ death.

    Complaints ignored

    27-year-old year old Luke lived with his parents in their rented accommodation. They told the Manchester Evening News that he was a “fit lad” and a talented artist.

    Luke developed a rash before his death, and complained of difficulty breathing. He developed fatal pneumonia, which caused acute respiratory distress syndrome. The coroner’s court found provisionally that this was due to mould at his home.

    Luke’s family have lived at the property for eight years. They complained to the council about the state of the accommodation. Environmental health officers visited last November.

    The landlord was instructed to make some improvements, but crucially they were not told to address the mould issue. This is despite the inspectors finding mould in Luke’s room.

    ‘Corporate manslaughter’

    Luke died just weeks before the inquest into Awaab’s death. Steve Topple previously wrote for the Canary:

    The coroner ruled that Awaab died due to mould exposure that RBH failed to deal with. The housing association repeatedly ignored Awaab’s family’s desperate pleas for help. Since the coroner’s verdict, RBH has sacked its boss after he refused to resign.

    The bottom line is this housing association committed what some people are saying is corporate manslaughter against him.

    Topple described how RBH initially blamed the mould in Awaab’s house on his family. Their response was clearly racist. The barrister for the Ishak family said that:

    At first, Rochdale Boroughwide Housing said that [the cause of the mould] was due to the ritual bathing practices of the family, or the cooking practices that are common among some cultures, all with no evidence.

    Blatant classism

    In Luke’s case, the environmental health officers found mould in his room, when they visited in November. However, they chose not to order the landlord to deal with it. They clearly felt it was ok for Luke to live in mouldy accommodation. This is a classist attitude that devalues the lives of renters. It’s an attitude that places more importance on the rights of landlords to make a profit, than on the health of their tenants.

    One of the police officers who accompanied the environmental health officer said – in evidence at the Coroner’s Court – that Luke’s room was “untidy” and there were “animals present”. These remarks reek of classism: the implication being that we shouldn’t be blaming the landlord for the mould, but blaming Luke for how he kept his room.

    The inquest into Luke’s death will examine whether his landlord bears criminal responsibility and whether the council should have intervened.

    The housing crisis is forcing us to live in dangerous squalor

    Luke’s family are private renters, while Awaab lived in social housing. But the underlying reasons for both their deaths stem from the state. Luke and Awaab – like many of us – were forced to live in unsafe conditions by the classist, racist society that we live in. Authorities allowed Luke to die because of classism, while RBH is responsible for Awaab’s death due to its institutional racism, and its classism, too.

    If you want to fight back against your housing conditions, then you might want to join a renters’ union. Check out the Acorn, Living Rent, and London Renters’ Union websites, and get organised.

    The featured image is of mould in a rented flat, via screenshot/ITV News

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Israeli soldiers kill a 15-year-old boy, as colonial forces tighten their grip on the Jordan Valley

    On Monday 10 April, Israeli soldiers shot and killed 15-year-old Mohammad Fayez Balhan in Aqbat Jaber refugee camp near the West Bank city of Jericho. Undercover Israeli forces infiltrated the camp and took up sharpshooter positions on the rooftops. The soldiers also injured two other young men, and detained a further five.

    The murder of Mohammad by Israeli forces brings the death toll this year to at least 96 Palestinians, 18 of whom were children.

    The raid is reminiscent of the massacre that took place in Aqbat Jaber in February. On that occasion, Israeli forces besieged Jericho for 10 days, and snipers killed five people.

    Provocation

    The murder of Mohammed happened in the context of the deliberate provocation that occurred at Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa mosque last week. Al Aqsa is the third-holiest site in Islam. On Wednesday 5 April, worshippers were viciously attacked by Israeli police.

    The Canary‘s Afroze Fatima Zaidi wrote:

    Dressed in riot gear, the attackers used teargas, stun grenades, and rubber-coated bullets. Video footage also showed them violently beating worshippers with rifles and batons.

    Israeli forces had arrested 450 people by Thursday 6 April.

    Friday was no different; thousands of Muslims had gathered at Al Aqsa for prayers. At least 2,300 police officers were in the vicinity of the mosque, and onlookers said that they attacked shop owners and street vendors. Police attacked worshippers and arrested 15 people, including two children. At the same time, Israel’s warplanes bombed Gaza.

    A brutal routine

    Attacks on worshippers at Al Aqsa during Ramadan are a brutal routine. Israel’s politicians know all too well that these attacks are a provocation. A similar attack in 2021 sparked an uprising across Palestine. In 2000, an attack by Israeli colonists led by former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon – who was accompanied by over 1000 police and soldiers – ignited the second Palestinian Intifada (mass uprising). In fact, the ensuing rebellion soon became known as the ‘Al Aqsa uprising’.

    The Israeli military often uses holiday periods as a smokescreen for its attacks, taking advantage of the comparative absence of international scrutiny. For example, the bloody 2009 attack on Gaza happened during the Christmas period, while the 2002 invasion of the West Bank happened over Easter.

    This last weekend has been bloody, too. Aside from the attacks on Al Aqsa, Israeli troops murdered 20-year-old Ayed Azzam Mahmoud Salim near Qalqilya on 8 April. Settlers rioted near Bethlehem on Easter Monday, attacking Palestinian communities and chanting “Death to Arabs”. Israeli forces failed to protect Palestinians. In fact, they attacked them with tear gas and live bullets.

    Tightening the colonial grip on the Jordan Valley

    Jericho is the largest Palestinian city in the Jordan Valley, a fertile region which demarcates the West Bank’s border with Jordan. It makes up roughly a third of the West Bank. The Israeli state has a long-held ambition to annex the Valley for itself. Netanyahu temporarily shelved these plans in 2020, in return for a deal with the United Arab Emirates. However, this colonial scheme is still very much alive. On 31 March this year, settlers in the Jordan Valley put up banners ominously stating:

    Sovereignty over the Jordan Valley has a national consensus

    The Palestinian residents of the Jordan Valley faced increased attacks throughout February and March 2023. The Palestinian Jordan Valley Solidarity (JVS) campaign reported that Israeli forces demolished homes and confiscated water infrastructure, while Israeli settlers carried out attacks on communities and sabotaged water tanks.

    Attacks against rural communities are becoming increasingly violent. JVS wrote that on 25 March:

    Abdul Karim Awadeh, a resident from Khribet Homsa [in the Jordan Valley], was assaulted by two Israeli settlers from a new outpost near the settlement Bekaot, leading to wounds on his head and leg. Moreover, they killed one of his sheep. The settlers attacked when he was grazing his herd in the land surrounding the village. The settlers‘ actions follow the strategy of intimidating the Palestinian population into leaving their land in order to facilitate the land grab.

    On Friday, in the wake of the brutal attacks on Al Aqsa, a car was attacked by Palestinians close to the Al-Hamra checkpoint in the Southern Jordan Valley. Three Israeli settlers eventually died from the injuries they sustained. The three women killed were reportedly born in the UK, but had immigrated to the illegal colony of Efrat. The settlement of Efrat is just outside Bethlehem, and many of its residents of British heritage.

    The Israeli state immediately ramped up its military operations in the Jordan Valley. Israeli soldiers shot and injured a young man in nearby Tubas on Friday.

    Escalating colonial violence

    The murder of Mohammad Fayez Balhan should be seen in the context of this escalating colonial violence, provocation, and resistance, spanning both recent years and the many decades preceding them. It is a killing that happened in the midst of a spiral of violence that is being orchestrated by the Israeli state in order to further its colonial aims. One of those aims is to annex the Jordan Valley permanently into the state of Israel.

    JVS summarised the situation:

    Israel continues efforts to eliminate the Palestinian presence in the Jordan Valley and isolate it from the West Bank in order to create facts on the ground before executing a unilateral plan that will exclude the region from the West Bank.

    Since Friday, the Jordan Valley has taken centre stage again. The threat of the annexation of the Valley is a shadow which looms behind the actions of Israeli forces in the area. The people of the Jordan Valley need us not to forget them, and to oppose the tightening of Israel’s colonial grip on their lands.

    Featured image via Al Jazeera/YouTube

    By Tom Anderson

  • Almost half of children of colour in England and Wales live in poverty

    Content Warning: This article contains reference to suicide.

    Almost half of all children of colour in Wales and England are living in poverty right now, according to research from campaigning organisation the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG). On top of that, new figures show the extent of the over-policing of kids of colour.

    CPAG has recently released statistics saying that:

    48% of children from black and minority ethnic groups live in poverty

    In total, 4.2 million children in England and Wales are currently living in poverty. That’s 29% of young people. This is an increase of 350,000 since last year.

    The highest possible price for poverty

    CPAG also calculated that 450,000 fewer kids would be in poverty if child benefit was increased by just £10 a week. The group argued that the government should extend the provision of free school meals, and scrap the two-child cap. The cap means that families don’t receive any extra Child Tax Credit or Universal Credit if they have more than two children.

    CPAG Chief executive Alison Garnham said in a statement:

    Children pay the highest possible price for poverty – they pay with their health, their well-being and their life chances. Our research shows the country also pays a heavy financial price.

    Black children are 11 times more likely to be strip-searched by police

    On top of this, the UK’s systematic racism discriminates against children of colour in a whole multitude of additional ways. The same weekend as CPAG released its figures on child poverty, news broke of fresh findings that Black children are 11 times more likely to experience being strip-searched by police than their white peers. This reflects the massive over-policing that Black people have to endure in the UK.

    The Children’s Commissioner found that police had strip-searched at least 2,847 children between 2018 and 2022. 38% of these children were Black, despite them making up less than 6% of the population.

    The Canary previously reported how police strip-searched a Black schoolgirl, known as Child Q, while she was on her period. Cops and teachers carried out the search on the child because they were looking for cannabis. The Children’s Commissioner’s statistics show that Child Q was far from alone.

    ‘Withdrawing consent from policing’

    The Canary‘s Sophie Purdy-Moore suggested some ways that we could protect children from degrading, unnecessary strip-searches. She wrote :

    Teachers – don’t invite police onto school grounds. Police are not equipped to prevent harm or to deal with the complex social issues that impact children’s lives. Their job is to criminalise.

    For the rest of us, this means resisting the presence of police in schools and intervening in every police stop we witness on the streets. It means withdrawing consent from all forms of policing. And it means demanding funding for specialist services that support vulnerable children and young people.

    It’s not just in schools that Black kids have to endure degrading searches. Met police officers strip-searched Olivia, a 15-year-old dual-heritage autistic child at a London police station. Olivia was also on her period at the time of the strip-search. Four Met police officers are currently under investigation for the incident.

    Both Olivia and Child Q experienced significant psychological harm as a result of these intrusive searches. Olivia made an attempt to take her own life following the incident.

    These two sets of figures expose the racism at the heart of our society, and illustrate two of the ways it affects the lives of people of colour. Kids of colour are much more likely to face economic disadvantages. On top of that, they are forced to deal with the actions of a police force that is institutionally racist, too.

    You can learn more about the grassroots campaign to end strip searches here, and also find out about CPAG’s campaign for teachers about ‘the cost of a school day’ here.

    Featured image via Wikimedia Commons/Katie Crampton (WMUK), cropped to 770x403px, CC BY-SA 4.0

    By Tom Anderson

  • Why Turkey’s new Green Left isn’t your average political party

    Last week the third largest party in the Turkish parliament, the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), announced that it would run in the elections on 14 May under the umbrella of a new party, the Green Left Party (YSP).

    The HDP is the largest party in an alliance of left-wing political parties called the Labour and Freedom Alliance. The HDP is facing a legal case demanding its closure, so it will use the Green Left Party’s ticket. The parties in the Alliance will be working together in the upcoming elections. And they’re are not putting forward a presidential candidate.

    Who are they up against?

    They are up against the fascistic People’s Alliance – led by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is allied with the extreme right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), amongst others. Erdoğan – in office since 2002, and president since 2014 – is the People’s Alliance’s presidential candidate. He called a referendum in 2017, in a successful move to massively increase his presidential powers, and has been widely criticised as a dictatorial, authoritarian ruler.

    Erdoğan’s biggest rival is the Nation Alliance. This is a six-party bloc which includes the Republican People’s Party (CHP). The CHP is Turkey’s second-largest electoral party. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu of the CHP will be the Nation Alliance’s presidential candidate.

    There is every likelihood that Erdoğan could lose substantially in the elections. Turkey is in the midst of a massive recession. Additionally, many people in Turkey blame Erdoğan for not taking more steps to help those affected by this year’s earthquake. In fact, the media has linked Erdoğan and his cronies to corruption in the construction industry that compromised building safety.

    What makes the Green Left Party different?

    The YSP isn’t your average parliamentary party. It’s part of a movement that wants to overcome the nation-state itself. The party seeks to lay the groundwork to decentralise state power in Turkey. Further to this, they want to enable local communities to build structures of radical democracy.

    The new party is just the latest electoral manifestation of the radical ideology of the Kurdish Freedom Movement. The HDP is by no means the first political party the Turkish state has criminalised, and the practice of refounding institutions under a new name to avoid repression has a long history.

    The HDP is running under the YSP’s ticket out of necessity. The Turkish state has imprisoned at least 6000 HDP members since 2015. The state is trying to close down the party, in order to prevent them from being able to take part in the elections.

    The HDP has been successful in local elections in Turkey’s largely Kurdish southeast. In response, the Turkish state has forcibly replaced the HDP’s elected mayors with state appointees, known as ‘kayyums’.

    The party insists on the principle of co-leadership, and co-mayorship. This anti-patriarchal practice means that no man can hold a position of power on his own. The HDP has faced legal challenges from the Turkish state as a result of demanding co-leadership. In fact, the state has criminalised the practice of co-mayorship.

    Part of a movement demanding radical democracy

    Since its foundation in 2012, the HDP has played an essential part in a movement for radical democracy. The democracy they demand is much broader than the sham offered by modern-day nation-states. In Bakur (the part of Kurdistan that lies within southeast Turkey), the HDP played a key role in the Democratic Society Congress (DTK). The DTK, now criminalised by the Turkish state, linked neighbourhood and village assemblies together with women’s organisations, trade unions, and ecological alliances in a region-wide confederation.

    In the west of Turkey, the movement established the People’s Democratic Congress (HDK). The HDK is currently still legal, and is part of the Labour and Freedom Alliance.

    These assemblies are attempts at bringing together Turkey’s left-wing and people’s movements. They want to create a base of power that is independent of the institutions of the state. For example, the DTK established a network of co-ops in an attempt to establish a non-capitalist cooperative economy in Bakur. These co-ops, however, were soon expropriated by the state.

    ‘The contrasting paradigm of the oppressed’

    The ideological inspiration for both the HDK and DTK is democratic confederalism. This is a paradigm of the Kurdish Freedom Movement, stemming from the prison writings of Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) co-founder Abdullah Öcalan. The Turkish state has held Öcalan in solitary confinement for over 24 years

    Here’s what Öcalan had to say about nation-states:

    the foundation of a state does not increase the freedom of a people.

    He continued:

    nation­ states have become serious obstacles for any social development. Democratic confederalism is the contrasting paradigm of the oppressed people. Democratic confederalism is a non­state social paradigm. It is not controlled by a state.

    And added:

    democratic confederalism is the cultural organizational blueprint of a democratic nation.

    Öcalan puts forward the concept of the ‘democratic nation‘ as a viable alternative to the all-encompassing power of the nation-state. In a democratic nation all the groups that make up society are guaranteed their own autonomy. They are represented within a directly democratic system.

    Decentralising Turkey

    The Green Left Party echoes Öcalan’s concept of establishing a democratic nation. In its inaugural declaration, YSP spokeswoman Çiğdem Kılıçgün Uçar said:

    We will remove this government [and] establish the Democratic Republic

    She continued:

    A Democratic Republic is possible with a Democratic Nation. The Democratic Nation is the democratic expression of a society in which all ethnic, cultural and religious identities coexist equally and freely and their existence is constitutionally guaranteed.

    The Green Left Party wants to decentralise Turkey, in order to enable people to make decisions at a local level.

    Additionally, Uçar said that the party wants to rewrite the Turkish constitution:

    We are ready to write a new democratic constitution in accordance with Turkey’s multi-identity, multi-cultural, multi-faith, multi-lingual structure, to write a constitution for all society with democratic participation and social negotiation!

    Co-leader İbrahim Akın said that the YSP wants to transfer authority, so that the people can be involved in managing themselves through local assemblies. He said:

    We are coming to build a strong local democracy in which the separation of powers is extended to the local level, the transfer of authority and resources to local governments is secured, and local participation mechanisms function.

    We will strengthen local governments based on democracy and equal representation with the will of the people participating in management and decision-making processes through assemblies, city councils, platforms, professional organisations and democratic mass organisations.

    The YSP’s statement says that the party stands in opposition to the state’s militaristic foreign policy, against male domination, and with LGBTI+ people, workers, and disabled people. It will continue the practice of co-leadership, and will act to defend nature and combat poverty. According to Uçar:

    We will build a new life where ecological assets are protected against the domination of nature and gender by the male-dominated capitalist system

    A brave stand against fascism

    There is much that those of us who are outside Turkey can learn from the movement that the YSP is part of. It is a movement that has chosen to engage in electoral politics, but one that has never let go of its revolutionary vision, or its critique of the state.

    One thing is for sure – Erdoğan and Turkey’s fascist right will fight tooth and nail against these ideas. That fight has already seen thousands of people imprisoned, and many have lost their lives too. Against this backdrop, the stand taken by the YSP is a brave one.

    Please note that the quotes from İbrahim Akın and Çiğdem Kılıçgün Uçar are taken from an unofficial translation.

    Featured image – HDP campaigning in London in 2018, via Philafrenzy/Wikimedia Commons (cropped to 770x403px)

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Pro-Palestine campaigners target Elbit arms firms’ accountants

    On 31 March, campaigners in Walsall took action against the Edwards Aldrige accounting firm. Edwards Aldridge provides accounting services to Elbit, Israel’s largest privately owned arms company.

    Anonymous campaigners threw red paint at Edwards Aldridge’s offices and stencilled slogans on the walls saying “Accounting for apartheid” and “Shut Elbit down”.

    Company accounts show that Edwards Aldridge provides services to Elbit’s subsidiaries in Leicester, Shenstone, Kent, and Tamworth. All of these factories exported military equipment to the Israeli state, according to export data from Campaign Against the Arms Trade.

    People have been taking action to force Elbit out of the UK for over a decade. However, direct action against the company started to snowball after the formation of Palestine Action in 2020. Pressure from Palestine Action, coupled with years of local campaigning by people in Oldham, led to the closure of Elbit’s Ferranti factory in January 2022. Its London HQ closed down permanently in June 2022, bowing to intense pressure.

    Elbit, a key part of Israel’s war machine

    Israel uses drones to attack Palestinians in Gaza, and increasingly in the West Bank too. For example, Dr Ghassan Hamdan is the Palestinian Medical Relief Society general manager in the Nablus area. Ghassan told the Canary that Israeli forces used an armed drone when they attacked Nablus in February.

    The Canary wrote last year:

    Elbit manufactures around 85% of Israel’s drones which have been used to massacre Palestinians in Gaza.

    For example – during Israel’s 51 day attack on Gaza in 2014 – Israeli drones killed 840 Palestinians. Drones were also used extensively in Israel’s 11 day attack on Gaza in 2021.

    ‘Complicit in the crimes of Israel’

    In a statement on its website, Palestine Action argued that:

    Companies working with Elbit are automatically complicit in the crimes of Israel. You are [complicit] in the murder of Palestinians if you are counting the cheques, leasing the factories, providing the deliveries or anything else in exchange for Elbit’s blood money. Edwards and any other firm working with Elbit should expect Palestine Action

    Campaigners are gearing up for a mass action at Elbit’s Leicester factory. Palestine Action has dubbed the planned action on 1 May a  “siege”. It is part of a renewed move to push Elbit out of Leicester, just as the company was forced to leave Oldham and London.

    Last week, Elbit was served a ‘community eviction notice’, ahead of the planned action:

    Campaigners symbolically blocked the gate of the Elbit factory in Shenstone, holding a banner displaying photos of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces. They pointed out that 91 people have been killed so far this year:

    Finally, on 28 March, Palestine solidarity campaigners took action at the premises of military trade association the ADS Group (aerospace, defense, security and space), protesting the group’s promotion of Elbit. Palestine Action wrote at the time:

    ADS Group have been locked-off, with activists positioned on scaffolding to increase the disruption of the weapons trade. Premises have been sprayed red by paint from a repurposed fire extinguisher, to represent the business-of-bloodshed that ADS Group conducts. A banner is displayed making the aim of the action clear: Shut Elbit Down.

    Palestine Action is urging people to sign up and pledge to join their 1 May siege of Elbit’s Leicester factory. Click here to find out more.

    Featured image is of the action at ADS Group, via Palestine Action

    By Tom Anderson

  • 40 people die in a Ciudad Juárez detention centre fire, after guards refused to open the doors

    40 people died after a fire broke out in a detention centre in Mexico. Prison guards refused to unlock the doors, leaving them to die. Mexican authorities were holding them in custody in Ciudad Juárez, near the US border.

    The fire broke out on Monday 27 March. Those killed were from Guatemala, Venezuela, El Salvador, Colombia, and Ecuador. 37 people died on the scene, and three died later in hospital.

    The guards just walked away

    US left-wing news outlet Democracy Now described how guards did nothing to help those trapped. It wrote:

    Surveillance video from the jail shows guards walking away as flames spread inside the jail cells, making no effort to open the jail cells or help the migrants who were trapped.

    Democracy Now interviewed a Venezuelan man, Raniel Murillo, who was part of a crowd of protesters outside the jail. He said:

    To all of those people who died, the guards could have opened the gates to let them out, because there was only a few meters between the gate that separated them from the migration officers. They didn’t open the gate, leaving them locked in. The fire advanced, and they didn’t leave. The guards didn’t help them, because they didn’t feel like it. The guards treat you badly.

    Juan Montes told Vice News that authorities had detained him at the centre on Monday. However, they had released him at 6pm because he has children. He said that there were at least 100 people “locked inside the cell”.

    Mexico: the state blames the prisoners

    Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador alleged that prisoners set fire to their mattresses in protest at their conditions. However, the detainees have challenged the government’s narrative.

    Katiusca Márquez told Vice News:

    They take everything. How would someone enter with a lighter?

    Katiusca said that immigration authorities abducted her and her whole family from the streets of Ciudad Juárez on 27 March. They took them all to the detention centre. Authorities had not released her brother, and she was waiting to find out what happened to him.

    Venezuelan migrant Orlando Ramos explained to Vice News:

    The Mexican government said that we started the fire. But they don’t ask why or what was happening before. They only listen to us when we die. But they never ask what we need, if we are doing okay, whether we are hungry,

    The Mexican president may be trying to blame the people he has locked up, but the state’s carceral policies killed these 40 people. Those who refused to help them are to blame for their deaths, along with the racist border regime upheld by the governments of Mexico and the US.

    Featured image via Wikimedia Commons/CBP photography, resized to 770*403

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • The French pensions revolt: A view from Marseille

    France is in revolt. Ever since the 24 March decision by Macron to push through hated pension reforms without a vote, people have been shutting down city centres, and occupying schools, universities, and workplaces.

    Much of the news has focused on the movement in Paris. However, the rebellion isn’t only in the capital. It is happening in cities, towns and villages across the country.

    The Canary spoke to Ana, an organiser from Marseille, who has been involved in the protests and demonstrations in the city. She agreed to tell us a little about what’s been happening over the last week.

    ‘Manifestation sauvage’

    Ana said that people have taken to the streets of Marseille almost every evening since Macron bypassed parliament by invoking article 49-3 of the French constitution. These nighttime protests are known as ‘manifestation sauvage’ in French, or (roughly translated) wildcat demonstrations. The city’s anarchist movement organises them.

    Ana said that the police have responded to the wildcat demonstrations with tear gas and violence. For example, police mobilised with force against demonstrators on Tuesday 28 March. The cops arrested at least six people. The protests are repressed by the riot police, known as the Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité (CRS) and the Brigade Anti-Criminalité (BAC):

    The CRS and BAC also have a large visible presence in the side streets, at the large pre-arranged trade union mobilisations.

    On 30 March, Ana told us that a demonstration was held in Marseille, protesting against police violence. Barricades were set up on the streets.

    Stopping the train lines and motorways

    As in other cities in France, the rebels of Marseille have used the tactic of stopping the roads and trains in order to force Macron to back down.

    The most recent big strike day was on 28 March. Trade unions organised a massive demonstration, with at least 280,000 people in Marseille participating. Members of several unions blockaded the St Charles railway station for over an hour. Prior to the blockade, the station was still operating in spite of the strike. People stopped the trains by occupying the tracks.

    Ana told us that members of the Solidaries union blocked also the motorway on 28 March, and people blocked Marseille’s bus and tram depot at St Pierre too.

    On 29 March, members of the CGT union used cars and trucks to bring traffic to a standstill on the roads and in motorway tunnels around Marseille.

    Ana told the Canary that students have repeatedly taken action to block the entrances to their schools and universities. This happened at Lycée Saint-Charles recently, for example. She also said that students blocked the university campus at St Charles at least twice in March too. One blockade lasted 24 hours.

    On 21 March, strikers occupied the oil depot at Fos-Sur-Mer, building burning barricades.

    Finishing what the Gilet Jaunes started

    We asked Ana whether she has hope that the movement will succeed. She told us that people are becoming weary after months of intense struggle since the strikes began last year:

    Are we going to win? I am a bit lost.. Honestly, people are very tired and struggling because of money and the rise in living costs. The strikes started at the end of last year, even though it was only one or two days… People are feeling the effects of the strike especially those on precarious contracts. In my opinion Macron was strategic – when he choose to use 49-3 in mid-March – when he knew people would have started to feel the loss from the strikes. He refused to meet the unions time and time again.
    But she says that the ongoing spirit of resistance gives her hope:
    But I have some hope – whether it’s the students blocking their schools or the unionists blocking tunnels and motorways – I dream we can finish what the Gilet Jaunes started in 2019 against Macron.
    The French revolt against pension reforms should give us hope too. Lessons can be learned from the intensity of the demonstrations and disruptive actions across France. If our movements in the UK hope to challenge the state’s attacks on all of us, then we will need to work together to generate the level of solidarity and militancy we’ve seen across France in the past months.
    Featured image via screenshot/RMC

    By Tom Anderson

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Bristolians commemorate the two year anniversary of the Bridewell uprising

    Hundreds of Bristolians marched on 21 March to mark the two-year anniversary of Bristol’s 2021 anti-police uprising outside Bridewell Police Station.

    Over 30 people have been sentenced to more than 100 years in prison since 21 March 2021. Many of them were found guilty of rioting. However, supporters say that they were defending themselves against police violence.

    The uprising began when police attacked a crowd of people who were demonstrating against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (now an Act).

    Many of us from the Canary were on the scene two years ago. Sophia Purdy-Moore wrote at the time:

    I saw police in riot gear hitting protesters round the head with batons. I did also see people at the front throwing bottles at police, but the response seemed disproportionate. The power imbalance felt completely off. At one point it looked as though their horses were going to charge into the crowd of peaceful protesters. The atmosphere was horrendous. There was a real sense of unpredictability and danger in the air

    She continued:

    People are sick and tired of the police acting with impunity. This is what happens when the state refuses to listen to our demands for justice.

    Our resistance continues to grow

    Bristol Anti Repression Campaign (BARC) issued a statement explaining why they wanted to commemorate the Bridewell uprising. They said:

    We marched to show that despite the brutal police violence of that night, despite the continued persecution of demonstrators through the courts, despite the demonisation in the media – our resistance continues to grow. We dropped huge banners next to the police station, occupied the streets and set off smoke grenades.

    Jasmine York has already served a prison sentence for her role in the 2021 demonstration. She said:

    Us protesters aren’t a threat to society, we are a threat to the state

    During the demonstration, Jasmine was hit repeatedly by officers. She said in court that she had acted to protect other protesters from the violence of the police.

    Jasmine continued:

    I believe, perhaps for my own sanity, that my incarceration symbolises how powerful we are as a unit and why it’s imperative we continue to be proactive in the face of state oppression.

    A message was also read out from Ryan Roberts. Ryan received the longest sentence of all after the uprising – a brutal 14 years in prison.

    Ryan sent a message to those assembled. He said:

    To everyone out there still fighting on the streets or in court don’t give in…we are up against a powerful and corrupt force so we got to stay strong and stay together.”

    Building power

    BARC’s statement concluded with a call to keep on organising against state repression:

    we are not just taking to the streets. We are building the power needed in our communities to confront repression directly. We are organising solidarity and care, growing deeper roots so they cannot stamp us out, and building towards an end to policing and prisons in their entirety.

    This is the slow, angry, patient work of building resistance. It was happening long before March 21st, 2021, and it will continue.

    You can find out how to write to the Kill the Bill prisoners here, or donate to this crowdfunder to support those in prison.

    Featured image via Bristol Anti Repression Campaign (with permission)

    By Tom Anderson