september 2021

graffiti obedience

malamulele dance

 

 

“September – when the world either nauseates with its numbing nothingness or bursts forth into a harvest of heartfelt hope”

– D.Spare

2020   2019   2018   2017  2016  2015   2014   2013

August 2021 here

Those aspects of social contestation linked to opposition to measures using the pretext of Covid have been put under the Covid1984 menu (September here)

There are obviously significant limits to providing links to information about situations I know little about. Some of this might give people the idea that struggle is advancing or happening far more than it in fact is, and may even blind people to the contradictions and complexities of any specific situation. However, despite the inevitable limitations,  I will continue to put up links if only as a method of keeping a record of events, though this will be reduced compared  with previous years. Information about Kashmir and the occupied territories of Palestine will not be put up here as these are constant daily occurrences, have been going on for years and other sites provide more information.

“Reading the morning newspaper is the realist’s morning prayer. One orients one’s attitude toward the world either by God or by what the world is. The former gives as much security as the latter, in that one knows how one stands. ”

Hegel

30/9/21:

Paraguay, Asuncion: clashes as indigenous resist intensification of land grab

“In the vicinity of the Paraguayan Congress there have been new clashes this Thursday between police and demonstrators, after an indigenous leader had been arrested on the occasion of the violent demonstrations that took place a day earlier in protest against a controversial law that raises the invasion of private land to a crime. The Paraguayan police arrested indigenous leader Derlis López Ortiz on Thursday for his alleged involvement in the vandalism that took place on Wednesday during the protests, which has provoked a new wave of altercations near the Congress, where a group of people have set up a kind of makeshift camp. When López Ortiz was arrested, a group of people began to throw stones and arrows, and the police responded with rubber bullets. Several policemen and demonstrators were injured during the scuffle…Peasant and indigenous groups have announced that they will remain camped in the central Plaza de Armas, which is in front of the Congress in Asunción, until the president, Mario Abdo Benítez, vetoes a law that provides up to ten years in prison for those who take privately owned land. “We understand that rights are being violated. They are trying to criminalise our struggle. We are going to continue in the square, the decision has been made. We know we are going to lose if we return to the communities,” said Julián Ramírez, an indigenous leader,…”The native communities are run over by the drug traffickers, the soy growers, the big cattle ranchers, like Senator Fidel Zavala,” Ramírez denounced, referring in this last case to one of the proponents of the law, the conservative senator from the Patria Querida party. “Zavala is a useless man who has millions of land and is not going to come out in favour of the people. They buy everything there is and it makes us angry, we say as Paraguayans that we come here to win or die”

28/9/21:

Belgium, Limburg: 135 buses sabotaged

Translation of a Dutch-language anarchist bulletin from Ghent:

***

Not just any morning rush hour

135 buses sabotaged in Limburg

– October 2021

I know, it’s the most normal thing in the world, but I still find it crazy: the daily rat race in the morning rush hour.
The still sleepy bodies silently move on en masse, rushed by the merciless hands of the clock. On auto-pilot to work, school or the umpteenth appointment with a social assistant. By now the daily traffic jam of the morning rush hour has returned to the proportions of before the pandemic – the realm of freedom, you know.

Disciplined, idle and productive we shall be! Now and then I myself among them, silently cursing at the system, at myself and the cup of weak and overpriced coffee in my hand. Submissive [- yeah, better!], we all rush where the economy, the school system or the government services want us to be. You just hope that one day something unexpected will happen. That this whole crazy normality machine grinds to a halt and suddenly there’s time for … something else.

Something else, you might say, is what happened in Limburg on Tuesday, September 28. When the first drivers of De Lijn [The Flemish public transport system] rode-off horribly early, they soon noticed that something was wrong. Their buses all turned out to have flat tires. In the course of the morning it became clear that no fewer than 135 buses had been sabotaged in the depots of Hasselt, Winterslag and Beverlo. Unknown persons must have entered the depots between midnight and 4 a.m. On most of the buses they cut off the valve of at least one tire, rendering the vehicles inoperable in an instant.

And so the morning rush hour turned into a mess. I know that most of the commuters probably have found it very annoying. That they will have been desperately searching for a solution on their smartphones. But I also suspect that many will have thought: “hell, today I’m not going where they’re expecting me”. I sincerely hope that they have made something beautiful of their day! Finally, here and there a little light will have gone on in a rebellious head: “Well, Well. Look what’s possible with a little courage and a little inventiveness.”

The motives of the saboteurs are left in the dark. The fact is that there are many good reasons for such acts. Public transport is an indispensable cog in the economic machine whose deadly rhythm we all know.

Yet perhaps a hypothesis. Barely a few days before the large-scale sabotage there was a strike in some sectors. It was the first time that the so-called ‘minimal service’ was applicable at De Lijn: strikers had to let the bosses know in writing at least 24 hours in advance that they will not be working, so that an alternative timetable can be organized. Even though strikes are usually started for very trivial reasons – and not, say, to unleash a general uprising – it remains a powerful weapon to bring everything to a standstill and to fight. With ‘minimal service’, this power is broken. Anyway, the saboteurs have convincingly demonstrated that you do not necessarily have to be many to bring things to a standstill. And all that without giving prior written notice.

The unions however didn’t manage to act quickly enough to expressly distance themselves from the sabotage. They are also asking management to urgently install cameras in the bus depots, as I read in the newspaper. Suddenly I was reminded that the union is actually a kind of valve, too. The bosses, the politicians, the shareholders and the good citizens ride in the bus. ‘The employees’* are crammed together in the tires. They puff from fatigue or blow from anger and so the pressure in the tire increases. Whenever the pressure in the tires gets too high, some air can escape through the valve – the union. But not too much! After all, the bus must be able to keep moving. If the bosses want to pump up some pressure, they usually do so through the union, because who else will make the workers accept yet another ‘compromise’? So it’s best to cut out that valve as well.

*In earlier, less pacified times the word ‘wage slaves’ was in vogue.

27/9/21:

India, Uttar Pradesh: over 1000 arrested following riot by mainly farmers protesting land grabs

France, Mayotte (French overseas territory): Town Hall and police station torched in riots against destruction of shanty town

The submissive collaborators of the Mayotte Citizens’ Collective declared: “The burning of the Koungou Town Hall and its municipal police to stop the destruction of the illegal immigrants’ shantytowns is a brutal message of reprisal and threat, a challenge to the authorities who have allowed these lawless areas to flourish, fed by free water, pirate electricity, social aid and duly subsidised associations. The illegal foreigners who have appropriated the land of Mahoran and raised their children at our expense in hatred of the Republic believe that they are now in control of the situation and want to push back the forces of order mobilised to destroy the illegal installations. With the deliberate destruction of public buildings representing our republican institutions, we have reached the point of no return in terms of challenging the rule of law in the 101st French department. Faced with the insurrectionary climate on the island, the Collectif des Citoyens de Mayotte is calling for a state of emergency in Mayotte and for reinforcements to be sent to restore law and order: the Republic can no longer retreat, Mayotte can no longer suffer more terror. Faced with illegal immigration, with 60% of foreigners on the island, the unleashing of juvenile delinquency and the retreat of the institutions, our department is imploding. “

22/9/21:

Kenya, Naivasha: massive riots, bus burnt, roads blocked, stores looted after killing of fisherman

20/9/21:

Germany Leipzig: burning barricades on demo and riot against cops

15/9/21:

Yemen: 3 die in protests against massive poverty,  electricity cut-offs, etc…presidential palace stormed

“Hundreds of stone-throwing protesters clashed with security forces in Aden’s Khour Maksour, Crater and Sheikh Othman districts where demonstrators blocked roads, set fire to government buildings and burned cars in the streets. “We came out to protest after our life has become impossible. There is no electricity, no water, and salaries can’t buy us anything. We are not going to wait until we die,” said Ahmed Saleh, 34, a protester and government employee. Other protests were reported in Shabwa and Abyan provinces over the last two days… dozens of demonstrators stormed Maashiq presidential palace where Hadi’s government is based.”

12/9/21:

Cambodia, Kandal: heavy clashes as cops protect airport construction against previous land owners

“…the protesters carried sticks and used slingshots to fire stones and molotov cocktail at police forces that were there to maintain security and order…Khim Somaly, a representative speaking on behalf of more than 300 families involved in the land dispute, said …“They are detaining them and accusing them of trying to kill police officers with farming tools and knives. Long story short, now the law is after them and whatever the law wants to do is right and whatever we do will be wrong,” .

Holland, Amsterdam: clashes on march for affordable housing as some demonstrators try to squat building

11/9/21:

Chile: clashes on anniversary of coup

Accurate text on this anniversary here. See also this and this

10/9/21:

France, Marseille: hunger strike and fire at prison for migrants

6/9/21:

France: Protonmail provided data leading to arrest of French activists

“Despite a model based on transparency and confidentiality of exchanges, Protonmail can be forced by the authorities to collect certain data from its users. This is what happened in France. When it comes to confidentiality and privacy, there are certain safeguards. When it comes to encrypted messaging, the applications Signal and Olvid are often mentioned, while Protonmail has the best reputation when it comes to email. But the latter has been getting bad press in early September. For many months now, the Place Sainte-Marthe neighbourhood in Paris has been the scene of a small war against gentrification. Media coverage of the event peaked with the illegal occupation of a restaurant, then under construction, by activists from the Youth for Climate association. Since then, people have been arrested, searches conducted and some activists have been tried. According to Secours Rouge, the police officers in charge of the case relied on web services, collecting photographs posted on Instagram, and metadata from Protonmail, after noticing exchanges made using an email address of this type. Protonmail responded to this request made via Europol by communicating the IP address and the fingerprint of the browser used, which did not fail to make users of its services react. Especially since Protonmail prides itself on not collecting any information on its customers. “Unlike competing services, we do not record any tracking information,” the company’s website states. “By default, we do not record metadata such as IP addresses used to log into accounts.” Terms of use widely published on social networks, where Andy Yen, the company’s founder, attempted to respond to his accusers. In a post on Reddit, Proton explained that it had received a legally binding order from the Swiss Federal Department of Justice which it is obliged to comply with, with no possibility of appeal or challenge to this particular request. “Under Swiss law, Proton may be compelled to collect information about accounts belonging to users who are the subject of a Swiss criminal investigation,” the company wrote. This is obviously not done by default, but only if Proton gets a legal request for a specific account. However, our encryption cannot be circumvented in any way.” So Proton can still temporarily collect certain information, such as the IP address of specifically targeted customers. But Protonmail is accused of not having warned its French customer of this data collection. Proton also took the opportunity to make a jab at the French authorities, who are very aggressive in this type of case, explaining that they take advantage of anti-terrorist laws to support their demands. The company recalls that it also provides access to the Tor network, offering complete anonymity to users.”

2/9/21:

Algeria, Kharrata: 2nd day of riots following demos demanding release of political prisoners… More here

“Since yesterday, the city of Kharrata has become a field of violent clashes between demonstrators and police forces that prevented the march in support of prisoners of conscience, scheduled for yesterday 1 September. At around 11am, demonstrators tried to assemble and then riot police were deployed on the ground. Immediately, police reinforcements arrived on the scene from Béjaia and the wilaya of Sétif. According to witnesses on the spot, the news of the police intervention, perceived as an “umpteenth provocation”, spread like wildfire in the town and its surroundings. It was from this moment on that all the shops lowered their curtains to make way for violent clashes between demonstrators and police forces. The latter used tear gas and rubber bullets in the two places in the city where clashes occurred. The riots broke out yesterday in Kherrata after the police prevented a march in support of prisoners of conscience. The security agents made numerous arrests and fired tear gas.”

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