Kompass-newsletter No. 116 - 07+08/2023
Maldusa on the situation on Lampedusa +++ Refugees from Libya: Protest in Brussels and success with release of Ain-Zara detainees +++ From 4-6 August in the Susa Valley in Italy: Passamontagna - Travelling Noborder Camp +++ 21-27 August in the Netherlands: Noborder Camp +++ The Pylos Shipwreck - Forensic Architecture and further Links +++ Sea Eye 4 - Declaration of Solidarity against Detention +++ Criminalisation of Migration in Greece - Study by borderline-europe +++ Flows of Racism and exploitation - Journal of the Transnational Migrants Coordination +++ Taz on the Riots in Paris +++ Reviews: Hanau - last day in the enquiry committee; Rwanda deportations from UK illegal +++ Outlook: 1. - 3 September in Leipzig: meeting of Welcome United; 14 - 19 September in Calais/Dunkerques: Noborder Camp against new deportation prison; 27 - 29 October in Bologna: next meeting of the Transnational Social Strike Platform
Dear friends,
"A highly contested space" was the title of the 6th edition of the publication "Echoes from the Central Mediterranean", which we presented in the last Kompass. We want to dedicate our introduction to the persistent struggle at this external EU border and first adopt the following lines from https://www.maldusa.org/en/:
„Lampedusa - 29th of June 2023: on this day 46 boats from Tunisia and Libya arrived on the island. Only during the last days of June more than 4000 people risked the dangerous routes and reached Italy to ask for protection and looking for future perspectives in Europe.
Bruxelles - 1st of July 2023: spokesperson for Refugees in Libya, for Refugees in Tunisia and from Alarm Phone Sahara in Niger came together in front of EU-institutions to accuse the death and suffering in these countries as a consequence of the EU-policy of border externalization.
Caltanissetta - 2nd of July 2023: about 50 people imprisoned in the repatriation centre rioted against the injustice of detention and the threat of deportation by setting fire to mattresses inside the halls and climbing on the roof of the building.“
The persistently high numbers of arrivals, especially on Lampedusa, have forced the Italian government to shorten transfer times in order to avoid a complete overload of the hotspot, the closed camp on the island. Most of the arrivals can travel on to Sicily or the Italian mainland within 72 hours.
At the same time, there is exceptionally positive news from Libya at the beginning of July. 225 people who were involved in the historic cycle of protests in Tripoli at the end of 2021 and who have been detained in the Ain-Zara camp since January 2022 - over 17 months! - in the Ain-Zara camp, have finally been released. Crucial to this appears to be the continuous protest of Refugees from Libya (https://www.refugeesinlibya.org/), whose spokesperson had repeatedly reiterated the demand for the release of the imprisoned Ain-Zara comrades-in-arms at countless events and demonstrations in Europe - including in December 2022 in front of the UNHCR headquarters in Geneva. As mentioned above, Refugees from Libya mobilised to Brussels at the end of June, and in the same days that the situation in Ain-Zara was again scandalised there at a press conference and in lobby talks in the EU Parliament, the feedback from those concerned came that the UNHCR was re-registering to initiate the release. Congratulations on this important milestone victory.
Fittingly, and in conclusion, another quote from the Maldusa post: "On land and at sea, let's keep building and extending antiracist and antifascist infrastructures for freedom of movement to welcome and to support people on the move in their powerful struggles for freedom. Let's be inspired by these struggles rather than being intimidated by political repression. People's passion for freedom is much stronger than any border and prison.“
With this in mind,
Solidarity greetings from the Kompass crew
P.S.: One day after the editorial deadline, on 16.7.23, the so-called "Team Europe“ - van der Leyen, Rutte and Meloni - visited Tunis for the second time in a short time in order to try to pay the Tunisian President Saied for an even more rigid and brutal border policy with almost one billion Euros ...