Black Flags

Black Flags by Atari Teenage Riot. YouTube link here.

Students aim for heart of Beast

STUDENTS in the UK are taking their anger to the heart of the Beast on Wednesday November 9.

Rather than repeating the symbolic demonstrations to the Houses of Parliament, they are heading to where the power really lies - the City of London.

There they will link up with Occupy LSX protesters near the Stock Exchange - and many other financial institutions will be boarding up their windows.

The development marks a significant step forward for the student movement, which hit the headlines a year ago.

Radicalised by the violent reaction of both state and media to their mass uprising - and by events elsewhere in the world - a generation of young people have seen past the facade of so-called democracy.

They understand that there is a de facto permanent  and unelected government, which sits not in Westminster but in the boardrooms of the financial elite.

The November 9 march, which starts at 12 noon from the University of London Union in Malet Street, hopes to link up with  thousands of striking electricians, who are marching with Unite the Union in protest at a 35% national pay cut. UK Uncut have also indicated support for the demonstration.

Michael Chessum, from the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts, said: “In marching on the City, we are sending a message that we will not let the Government to hand over education to the markets. Education should be a public service, accessible to all – not a corporate enterprise.”

Mexican anarchists torch Walmart

MEXICAN anarchists have torched a branch of US supermarket chain Walmart in Velacruz.

Said a statement from the CCF: "Over the 45 days since forming this new organization for antagonistic struggle, we have lashed out at the system of domination, showing that struggle is possible because the system is vulnerable.

"We’ve left behind the fear and indignation of the broken, and made the shift to decisive struggle against domination.

"We don’t want to change capital and the State, we don’t want to change their laws, we don’t want improvements, we don’t want to change technology, we don’t want to change domination. WE WANT TO DESTROY THEM!

"The supposed differences between electoral parties don’t matter to us, nor do the lies and promises of Peña Nieto, AMLO, Marcelo, or Vasquez Mota. THEY MAKE NO DIFFERENCE TO US BECAUSE WE FIGHT AGAINST DOMINATION, WHETHER RIGHTIST, LEFTIST, POPULIST, OR REVOLUTIONARY."

USA's sham 'democracy' is exposed

THE USA is showing the world what it really means by democracy, as police thugs are sent in to break up Occupy protests.

The latest nauseating incident came in Denver, Colorado.

Explained a report on Indymedia: "There are few scarier sights than that of 100 police officers putting on gas masks. That view, along with the largest showing of police force yet, graced Occupy Denver's weekly rally today when state and city police reacted to the renewed presence of tents.

"The unrest was met with pepper spray, batons, an unknown number of arrests and at least one protester being shot out of a tree with a round of rubber bullets.

"'It was a great party until the police crashed it with hundreds of rubber bullet guns,' says protester Kerri Kellerman, who was arrested during both of the first two rounds. 'We keep putting on peaceful protests, and they keep crashing them until it's not peaceful at all anymore once they're here'.

"Early in the day, Occupy organizers called out on social media for people to show up in mass numbers for the Saturday rally to support efforts to "take back the park." This focused mostly on setting up eleven tents as a symbol of the movement's freedom and a reminder of the need it faces for shelter from increasingly cold weather. The majority of the tents were reclaimed from the state patrol yesterday by protesters with IDs after they were removed from the group's previous site in Lincoln Park.

"By the time the day's approximately 2,000-person march rounded its way back to the campsite, with a long stop in front of the Capitol building, officers had mobilized and formed ranks around the area in preparation.

"At about 3:30 p.m., the first round of violent interaction occurred on the side of the park opposite the tents. Officers moved in on the gathering with rubber bullet guns already out and pointed -- an increase in aggression compared to the beginnings of previous demonstrations.

"As protesters grouped to shout chants at the cops and form a barrier between the officers and the camp, police opened fire on the group and openly sprayed tear gas at any occupiers standing in the way. One protester, Andrew Cleres, was shot from a tree with an entire round of rubber bullets while taking photos of the scene."

Meanwhile, authorities in Nashville have tried to use a curfew to stop the protests, thus further revealing the truth behind the big lie of  American 'free speech'.

Music for the global insurrection

'WHEN injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty."

That's the quote from Thomas Jefferson that ends this remix video from the USA celebrating the Global Insurrection that now finally seems to be breaking out.

Another protest camp attacked

 
THE HIRED thugs of neoliberalism have again violently attacked the pro-democracy #occupy movement - this time in Oakland, California.

Reports CBS News: "Oakland's City Hall was the site of conflict throughout the day. Authorities used a pre-dawn raid to dismantle an Occupy Wall Street encampment that had taken over a plaza outside the government headquarters for more than two weeks.

"Police removed about 170 demonstrators who had been staying in the area overnight after repeatedly being warned that such a camp was illegal and they faced arrest by remaining. City officials said 97 people were arrested in the morning raid.

"In less than an hour, the 2-week-old, miniature makeshift city was in ruins. Scattered across the plaza in front of City Hall were overturned tents, pillows, sleeping bags, yoga mats, tarps, backpacks, food wrappers and water bottles. Signs decrying corporations and police still hung from lampposts or lay on the ground.

"Later Tuesday, hundreds of protesters gathered at a library and marched through downtown Oakland. They were met by police officers in riot gear, and several small skirmishes broke out."

As we pointed out with regard to the attacks on camps in Australia, this kind of repression is inevitable if the movement keeps up momentum.

But if we keep resisting, it can only make us stronger.

Brutal eviction of #occupy camp

 


#OCCUPY protesters in Australia have experienced what lies ahead for  the whole global movement if it keeps up its momentum.

Police were sent in to evict campers in both Melbourne (see above) and Sydney.

The ABC News report  in Melbourne said: "Riot and mounted police officers took several hours to disperse the demonstrators who had been occupying the square.

"The protesters want the Victorian ombudsman to investigate what they say are 43 cases of police violence.

"They include eye-gouging, punches and the use of pepper spray on people including children."

Said the Sydney Central website: "After eight days camping out in Martin Place, Occupy Sydney protesters were evicted at 5am on Sunday morning, with 40 arrested on the spot.

"Twenty-nine were issued fines and four were charged with assaulting police."

Protesters in both cities have pledged to return and show no signs of giving in.

The simple truth is that the capitalist system cannot deliver democracy, as this would bring an end to its exploitation and power.

While at the moment it likes to pretend that it is democratically unaccountable, this charade is becoming increasingly hard for it to maintain.

Authorities are hoping the current wave of revolt will die out of its own accord, but if it doesn't, then scenes like those in Melbourne will become more and more common.

The fight is only just beginning.

Riot Gran is new Greek icon

FIRST there was Loukanikos the Riot Dog and now Athens has a new symbol of hope and global resistance - Riot Gran!

This video, posted by From the Greek Streets, shows an elderly woman who, fed up with police brutality, appeared out of nowhere determined to attack the Greek riot police with stones and marbles on October 19.

Meanwhile the site reports on a resolution by the Popular Assembly of Syntagma Square that utterly condemns the outrageously counter-revolutionary actions of the Stalinists during last week's protests, when they blocked protesters from storming parliament then claimed they had been attacked by 'thugs'.

It says, in part: "From yesterday on, definitively and irreversibly, the so-called 'Communist Party' is no more than a barrier against the attempt to bury the parliamentary corpse.

"Any free human struggling for their dignity in these crucial days must politically target it [in return]. This proposition should not be read as a split in the movement.

"We might have common problems and common targets with the plain voters of the 'Communist Party', but the politics and the practice of the leadership to which they are glued follows by word the orders of the government and the envoys of the IMF, EU and the ECB.

"We never marched side-by-side with them, there will never be with us. We must all keep in mind that the 'Communist Party' will act as a fifth column of the dictatorial regime, hoping once again to grab some crumbs off the parliamentary table, just like it did in 1990.

"The stance of all political groupings, whether parliamentary or not, which supported the acts of the 'Communist Party', either indirectly with their silence, or directly with their statements, is equally condemnable.

"For as long as these parties remain within a parliament comprising of order-recipients of the TROIKA and continue to receive their fat salaries, they are entirely co-responsible for what has happened so far and what is to come.

"Their negative votes to the memorandums and combined laws reveal precisely their role in the dictatorship: they provide the alibi of polyphony and democracy, in this entirely set-up parliament of representatives, in order for the impoverished people to continue counting the ballots in each fixed and predetermined voting of laws that abolish their future – while at the same time being fed with the illusion that someone speaks on their behalf and their interest."

Stalinists and Euro-cops block revolution

STATE repression against the Greek uprising hit a new low on Thursday as Stalinist trade unionists were deployed to defend the parliament buildings from the wrath of the people at yet more 'austerity' measures.

And when one of the reactionary pseudo-leftists died as a result of police tear gas, the corporate media tried to blame radical protesters with talk of  'head injuries from a rock' that was later proved unfounded.

Reports From the Greek Streets: "The 53-year old demonstrator was a member of the stalinist union, PAME. His name was Dimitris Kotsaridis. It is officially confirmed by the hospital’s report that the 53-year old carried no head injuries as originally reported, and that he has died from inhaling an excessive amount of asphyxiation gas shot by the police."

Corporate media have attempted to frame the situation as nice 'peaceful' protesters being attacked by nasty 'violent' ones, choosing to ignore the policing role being adopted by PAME, which maintained direct contact with police and even handed over protesters it didn't like to the cops. 

This line has been echoed by dire communist party newspaper The Morning Star in the UK - "violent anarchist thugs attacked peaceful protests in Athens" - exposing its deeply anti-revolutionary mindset and ignoring the fact that other trade unionists and left-wingers, including Trotskyists, were forced to take on the Stalinist volunteer cops.

Explains Contra Info: "It must be clear that PAME and KNE are not communists. They are Stalinist snitches and ruffians who work for the regime."

Meanwhile, many protesters reported hearing riot cops talking to each  other in English - it seems that, with Greek police morale at an all-time low, neoliberal reinforcements have been brought in from the European Gendarmerie Force.

The website of this little-known organisation describes it as "an initiative of five EU member states - France, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal and Spain - aimed at improving the crisis management capability in sensitive areas."

It is clear that the neoliberal system regards Greece as a test case for the imposition of  21st century slavery on Europe and is prepared to pour massive resources into preventing rebellion.

Simultaneous Greek-style uprisings across the continent are probably therefore necessary to overpower the oppressors.

Greeks rise up and trash bank

GREEK people have risen up against neoliberal tyranny, with massive and passionate protests across the country.

Wednesday saw the first of two days of general strike, as the government prepared to inflict yet more banker-imposed misery on the population.

Reported The Independent: "Greece has been paralysed by a 48-hour general strike that began yesterday and cast doubt on the unpopular government's ability to implement reforms demanded by the European Union in return for further bailout money.

"Black-masked youths hurled chunks of marble and petrol bombs at riot police in front of the parliament building in the centre of Athens.

"Police responded with stun grenades and tear gas as clashes spread to neighbouring streets after mass rallies, where protesters demanded an end to tax rises and salary cuts that they say are reducing them to poverty.

"Acrid plumes of black smoke rose from blazing bins of uncollected rubbish and mixed with the white clouds of tear gas. Chunks of rock and broken glass littered the streets around the parliament."

From The Greek Streets, which is providing regular updates, said a "huge, diverse crowd" had attacked the Bank of Greece, trashing it inside.

Greek shuts down in defiance

GREECE is getting close to becoming ungovernable, as resistance to neoliberal 'austerity' hardens.

A two-day general strike on October 19 and 20 is set to bring the whole country to a standstill, with hundreds of thousands taking to the streets in defiance of the bankers, their political puppets and their hired thugs.

From The Greek Streets comments: "Mapping out the sectors striking in Greece this week is a rather formidable task; nearly everyone is on strike."

However, those involved include dock workers, tax office workers, workers at the ministry of finance, lawyers, municipal workers, workers at the Agricultural Bank, railway workers, public sector doctors, public sector mechanics, air traffic controllers, bank staff and journalists.

Says the blog: "There is a huge amount at stake in this general strike. But whatever we see and do in the streets of Athens is a mere glimpse of our fast-forward trajectories, of our willingness and our collective ability to push through into the future.

"Whatever repression we might endure, whatever stubbornness we face from the side of a power still unable to comprehend its time is over, this is our own history that is playing into fast-forward, these are our bright, our vivid, our spotless days that have come."

Latest updates at From The Greek Streets.

Brutal cop kicks woman in head

A SHOCKING video of a cop brutally kicking a handcuffed female protester in the head has emerged on the internet.

Note that this footage shows the incident in slow motion - a real-speed version can be seen here.

Reports Keep Talking Greece: "A group of Indignados made up of protestors from several European countries arrived in Brussels last week after walking the 1562km from Madrid.

"Wednesday’s incident happened during an otherwise peaceful demonstration in front of the headquarters of the bank Dexia on the Rogierplein in the Sint-Joost-ten-Node area of the city."

The woman, who is Greek, was interviewed by the authorities after the video surfaced and the cop has been suspended.

The point to remember here is that protesting peacefully does not mean police will not physically attack you - in fact, for some of them the reverse is true.

Tahrir revolt comes to London

AN EGYPTIAN connection to the Occupy London protest in Britain has been identified by the Almasry Alyoum website.

It writes: "Around 3000 people flooded the square outside St. Paul’s on Saturday, partaking in a day of coordinated global protests.

"Tens of thousands marched in cities across the world, from New York to Rome, under the collective banner 'We are the 99 percent' – against government austerity, corporate greed and an unjust economic system.

"Occupy Wall Street and the Spanish Indignados (Indignants) are widely credited as an inspiration for these protests, but Egypt and the Arab Spring also had a presence in London’s occupation.

"A street sign that renamed the area "Tahrir Square" was erected early on in the day, a banner declaring "The IMF is our global Mubarak" hung from one man’s tent, and a handful of Egyptian protesters carried signs critical of Egypt’s current military rulers."

Rome burns as global revolt ignites

A WORLDWIDE revolt against capitalism has broken out, with protests taking place all across the world on Saturday October 15.

In Rome, rebels took on the hated riot police, torching their vans and blocking the streets with barricades, in one of the biggest uprisings in the Italian capital for years.

The unprecedented day of protests kicked off in New Zealand and Australia and spread across Asia and Europe and then over to the USA and Latin America, with nearly 1,000 cities involved.

Numbers in New York swelled to 20,000 as the momentum of the movement in the USA shows no sign of slowing. Police attacked the crowds and more than 70 people were arrested.

In London, thousands of people gathered near the Stock Exchange and, despite heavy-handed policing, hundreds stayed on to camp overnight in a Tahrir-style tent city.

Some 100,000 people gathered in Madrid, where the movement took on its current form thanks to the inspiration of the Tunisians and Egyptians.

While the #occupy movement places great theoretical stress on non-violent protests, rebels on the streets are unlikely to simply lie down when confronted with the inevitable violence of a system under attack.

The revolution has begun.

The People are Gonna Win!

 


'THE People Are Gonna Win' is the title of this song from the 2011 revolutionary movement in the United States.

In style and presentation it could hardly be more different to the 'They Will Not Control Us!' video from the UK we linked to in August, but the message is very much the same.

The winds of change are blowing.

Rise up on October 15!

"PEOPLE of the world, rise up on October 15th!"

That's the message from the United for Global Change website, which is now listing more than 800 cities across the globe where people will be taking to the streets and squares on Saturday.

It says: "From America to Asia, from Africa to Europe, people are rising up to claim their rights and demand a true democracy.

"The ruling powers work for the benefit of just a few, ignoring the will of the vast majority and the human and environmental price we all have to pay. This intolerable situation must end.

"United in one voice, we will let politicians, and the financial elites they serve, know it is up to us, the people, to decide our future. We are not goods in the hands of politicians and bankers who do not represent us.

"It’s time for us to unite. It’s time for them to listen."

I'm not moving!

THIS video nicely demonstrates the total hypocrisy of neoliberal politicians who preach democracy and dissent abroad and crush it on their home turf.

It also brings to life the growing tide of anger and revolt that is sweeping the globe and bringing so much hope to all those who yearn to see this corrupt cancer of a civilization disintegrate and die.

Police attack Boston protesters

THE AMERICAN authorities have started to violently attack the anti-neoliberal protests sweeping the country.

The development comes as the US beats the diversionary drum of war with spurious allegations of an Iranian plot to use Mexicans to kill the Saudi ambassador in the USA.

The police attack came in Boston, where 141 people were arrested.  Occupy Boston reports: "The early morning arrests (1:30 am) were for trespassing and unlawful assembly.

"After almost 15 hours in custody, all of the peaceful demonstrators detained by the Boston Police Department had finally been released as of 6 pm on October 11. Occupy Boston has many eye-witness accounts and videos of police misconduct during the arrests.

"Perhaps the most disturbing, and characteristic, clip is of a member of Veterans for Peace being thrown to the ground multiple times without provocation.

"Street medics and clearly marked legal observers who were also detained despite explanation that they were neutral observers, and in sharp contrast to how non-violent arrests ordinarily take place."

The police attack has come as a surprise to some campaigners, who naively believed the propaganda line that the state only uses violence against those who are themselves violent.

In fact, of course, the state can only exist through the constant use of force and violence to impose its power.

By showing their hand in this way, the US authorities risk radicalising the 'occupy' protesters across the country.

As that famous American president John F Kennedy once said: "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."

Greek minister flushed out of cinema

 

A GREEK minister has been forced out of a cinema by protesters, as popular anger at neoliberal 'austerity' measures spirals.  

From the Greek Streets reports that the Greek government’s Minister of Interior affairs (Home Office) Harris Kastanidis was spotted in a cinema in Thessaloniki watching a movie.

A few hundred students stormed the cinema chanting slogans and threw yoghurt at him.

Several members of the audience joined the students in booing Kastanidis and clapping when the yoghurt was thrown at him.

Among other slogans which can be heard on the video are: ‘Let’s see who will be first to jump into the helicopter when this marvellous night like Argentina will come’, ‘In Greece, Turkey and Macedonia the enemy is in the ministries and in the banks’ and ‘Terrorism is wage slavery, no peace with the bosses’.

Popular revolt against neoliberalism

 
POPULAR revolt against neoliberal greed continues to spread across the USA.

The Occupy Together website is now reporting events in more than 1,000 cities and towns across the country.

News of the protests is also reaching a wider public, after an initial lack of reporting from the corporate media.

Says CBS: "In New York, the protest is called "Occupy Wall Street" - but around the nation, where the movement is picking up steam, it's being called "Occupy Together."

"This week, CBS News correspondent Michelle Miller reported on "The Early Show on Saturday Morning," demonstrations were held in more than a dozen cities, from Los Angeles to Richmond, Va., to downtown Minneapolis, Minn.

"In Minneapolis, one demonstrator told CBS News, "We're here because we want the big dudes to start paying."

"More demonstrations are scheduled this weekend in cities like Indianapolis, Ind.

"This week, unions joined the protest, marching through New York's Financial District during rush hour Wednesday.

"Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, told CBS News, "They are basically sending us a message that says, 'Don't create a society where one percent basically has all the wealth.'"

"Approximately 5,000 people marched on Foley Square in New York Wednesday. By late evening, police and protesters clashed, and 23 people were arrested."

Rebels attack mining firms

ANTI-CAPITALIST rebels stormed three mining companies in the Philippines on Monday, burning heavy equipment, disarming guards and briefly holding several people.

Forbes.com said this was their biggest attack this year.

The New People's Army guerrillas then ambushed a convoy led by a police general that was responding to the attack in remote Claver township in Surigao del Norte province.

One of the companies that came under attack, Taganito Mining Corp., was forced to temporarily halt operations because of the magnitude of the assault.

Said Minda News: "Around 200 rebels from the NPA’s guerrilla front 16 led by a certain Artem or Doming staged the attack, the military official said.

“'Magulong-magulo. The rebels wearing army uniforms conducted checkpoints leading to Claver town. This created confusion among responding soldiers and policemen,' Osias said.

"He said the rebels manning a checkpoint ambushed a convoy of soldiers responding to the attack today.

"Reports from the police office in Surigao del Norte said the rebels used dump trucks and other heavy equipment to block reinforcements in Sitio Baoy, Barangay San Isidro in Gigaguit town and Barangay Lagdaon in Claver town, all in Surigao del Norte.

"Osias said that aside from torching heavy equipment, the rebels seized thirty-two 9mm pistols from the Taganito Mining Corporation.

"He said three groups of rebels simultaneously attacked the three mining firms located adjacent to each other in Claver, around 9a.m.

"The first group of rebels went to Taganito Mining Corporation in Barangay Taganito killing four guards who offered resistance. They later burned the firm’s guesthouse and seized the 9mm pistols from the guards.

"During the three-hour attack, the rebels also barged into the office of the Platinum Group Mining Corporation in Barangay Cadiano and burned company equipment.

"At around 12:30 pm, another group of rebels proceeded to TH PAL Mining Corporation. Osias said the rebels burned two barges, ten Volvo dump trucks and eight Volvo backhoes."

Revolt spreads in the USA

THE GLOBAL anti-capitalist revolt continues to spread through the heart of the beast itself, the United States of America.

And there are signs that the neoliberal authorities are beginning to panic, with more than 700 people arrested on Brooklyn Bridge, New York.

Reports Reuters: "Occupy Wall Street, a movement spurred by the country’s economic malaise, turned into a national protest over the weekend when mass arrests in New York focused media attention on the protestors and political action spread to other cities.

"In New York, police arrested more than 700 civilians on Saturday for turning the Brooklyn Bridge into a walkway.

"And copycat movements spread to Chicago and Los Angeles, where hundreds of protestors are now camped out in front of City Hall.

"The media largely ignored the protestors when they first began to congregate in lower Manhattan Sept. 17.

"But celebrity visits have helped put the protestors on the map, as has the Twitterverse and pictures of topless protestors demanding jobs.

"In New York, actresses Susan Sarandon and Roseanne Barr have come by, as have rapper Lupe Fiasco and Princeton professor and activist Cornel West."

This video from RT shows the atmosphere at the NY protests.

Saudi state attacks protesters

 

 

STATE forces in Saudi Arabia have attacked pro-reform protesters in the Qatif Governorate in the Eastern Province of the country.

The Saudis had gathered in an anti-government demonstration in the province's Awamiyah village, says a report from Press TV.

It says: "They chanted slogans against the province's Governor, Prince Mohammed bin Fahd, -- the son of the late King Fahd bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud.

"Reports say the forces arrested a 70-year-old man, whose son had participated in the protests, demanding the son to surrender himself in exchange for his father's release.

"A larger demonstration is scheduled for Monday in the city of Qatif, where protesters often take to the streets despite a heavy security presence to condemn Riyadh's role in the brutal crackdown on anti-regime protesters in Bahrain.

"The Saudi demonstrators call for respect for human rights, implementation of further reforms, freedom of expression, and the release of political prisoners, some of whom have been held without trial for more than 16 years.

"Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy, known for its intolerance of dissent. Earlier in the year, the Saudi Interior Ministry imposed a ban on all kinds of demonstrations and public gatherings.

"Human Rights Watch says hundreds of dissidents have been arrested since February as part of the Saudi government's suppression of anti-government protests.

"According to the Saudi-based Human Rights First Society (HRFS), the detainees were subjected to physical and mental torture."

Revolutionary ripples in the USA

TWO thousand people marched on New York's police HQ on Friday, angered by brutal attacks on anti-capitalist protesters.

Video footage on YouTube showed a shocking and unprovoked assault on Occupy Wall Street activists.

In its report on the protest, RTE reports that the crowd shouted "We got sold out!" as it snaked through rush hour traffic in the spiritual home of neoliberalism. One placard declared "NYPD protects billionaires and Wall Street."

Other hand drawn placards included: "Nazi bankers" and "people before dollars".

Adds the report: "It was the first time the protesters tried marching on New York's high-tech police headquarters at One Police Plaza, the nerve centre of one of the world's most sophisticated security services.

"Numbers were swelled on Friday by support from local unions, including the Transport Workers Union, and by youths responding to false rumours on the internet that British band Radiohead was going to play a free concert at the protest camp.

"Protesters added police brutality to their lengthy and still vaguely defined list of grievances after an incident a week ago when a senior officer used pepper spray against four demonstrators who had already been shut inside a police pen."

The protest movement is now spreading to other cities such as Boston, where anti-bank protests are being staged this weekend.

The #occupytheworld hashtag on Twitter is growing in popularity as the shockwave of rebellion crosses the planet.

One user commented: "The beauty of the 99% coming together to fight for change and revolution makes me cry."