Trucks

Below you can see a description of some of our nearly 20 trucks. All the trucks are organized by groups that are active in different struggles and are representing our diversity and the diversity of fights that we face. We are many, we’ll come united!

 

 

Stop Dublin deportations!

Deport Dublin not refugees!

Still, refugees are being pushed back and forth within Europe. Many of them reach Germany after an odyssey through Europe which starts with the registration of their fingerprints at the first place of arrival – e.g. in Italy. Due to the Dublin regulation, the country which did not prevent the entry of refugees is responsible for their asylum claim.

Every day, there is silent and loud protest going on against deportations within Europe:

– In Osnabrück, hundreds of Sudanese refugees are organizing strong protest in a camp. They chose whistles as their instrument of resistance. In night shifts, they keep watch and use the whistles to trigger an alarm in the camp. All the others join them and get out of their rooms. Therefore, the police is usually not able to identify the wanted person and they have to cancel the operation. Collective protest is also happing in other camps.

– In the early morning, before a deportation is supposed to take place, people are often not traceable. They sleep in the home of friends or known persons. As long as they show up from time to time at their official accommodation centre, they are not deemed absconded.

– Some have even protested against the deportation in the airplane – and pilots refused to transport people travelling involuntarily.

– People who have been deported to Italy do not stay there – most of them leave again. They go back to Germany or to other European countries. Until they find a safe place to stay.

On the 16th of September, we will bring our (often silent) protest against so-called Dublin-deportations onto the streets. Our truck is equipped with a banner, which shows symbolically how we literally drown in the fingerprints (see picture below). We contrast this with the new symbol of our resistance, a huge whistle. We will carry many whistles with us. The Sudanese friends from Osnabrück will tell the story of their resistance – as many others of us who have resisted in many different ways the curse of the fingerprint. We will have photos and other objects with us to give visibility to our struggles. Moreover, we will distribute practical information against deportations in many languages.

Participating groups:

· Refugees for change Rhine-Main

· Exekutivausschuss der Geflüchteten in der Unterkunft im Ickerweg 120 in Osnabrück

· Refugee Cafe and Oromo Refugee Movement Darmstadt

· Lampedusa in Hanau

· And everyone who wants to join our resistance…

 

City Plaza Hotel – Athen

refugee accommodation and solidarity space city plaza

To occupy a hotel which remained closed for 7 years in the center of Athens was a conscious and political decision.

City Plaza accepted the challenge to show that in a world of global capitalism and with the increase of borders, solidarity is still a weapon in the fight for a better, just future.

It became a real-life example to prove that it’s possible to house refugees in the city center, in much better conditions than in camps and several NGO accommodations.

Additionally we see City Plaza as a center for struggles against the anti-refugee policy of governments and racist movements in society. We show that there is another way and fight for social and political rights of refugees. Our answer is solidarity!

This self-understanding as an example not a solution and center of struggle is leading us through everything we do and decide.

Where?

City Plaza is a refugee accommodation and solidarity space in the heart of Athens, Greece.

What?

Following the closure of the borders when the EU trapped almost 65,000 refugees in Greece, the Greek government created more than 49 detention centres and camps. City Plaza offers a safe and dignified alternative to these places where the conditions are wretched, unclean and inhumane.

On the 22nd of April 2016 refugees, volunteers and solidarity activists occupied City Plaza Hotel which had been closed for 7 years.

126 rooms on 7 floors. A reception, bar, dining room, kitchen, storage, play ground, health care centre, roof terrace, classroom and library.

City Plaza is supported exclusively through political solidarity and individual donations.

Who?

400 people live together at City Plaza.

The numbers: More than 100 families: 165 children, 100 men, 115 women, 35 locals, activists and volunteers.

Participating groups:

  • former city plaza inhabitants
  • w2eu Berlin
  • Bag Mohajer

 

De-Walling the World

Symbology used in our truck
As per our truck name ” De-Walling the World”, we are gonna build a wall around our truck, with no possibility to see what it is on the other side. By means of the performance, this wall will be piece by piece tear down, giving pass to a flourishing moment of communion.
Why do you participate – 
18591km strives to raise awareness and drive social change. With our actions and projects we give light to certain topics that are excluded from the media, we bring other point of views to the main streamed discurse, in doing that we aim western society to start to question themselves about certain accepted reasons giving for granted. We invite them to look further, to open their minds and to see realities from another perspective, to put themselves on somebody else´s shoes, to understand that if we are here, it is because others are there.
We think it is important to break down all walls, starting from the ones in our minds.
What is your political perspective –
Nowdays the word “Politic” lost its essence, none of our “political leaders” govern pursuing the wider benefit of their citizens, but rather their own benefit, or preserve the interest of the big coorporations. This is what is ruling us. Observing many of the problems affecting our world currently, we could determine that all of them have the same origin: a lost of our ethical values. This is what we have to fight for to get back. If our politicians are not willing to make that step, and the events happening in the last years, are a clear evidence of their lack of interest, then it is the time for us, civilians to assume our responsability and encourage others to join us with this purpose.
History has proven that walls have brought indeed the opposite from its intention. If we constantly use the word “Globalisation” as a characterist of our current history, then let´s be faithful to its meaning and open borders and tear down the walls.
De-Walling The World” Truck concept
    
In a world where more and more walls are being erected every day.
In a world that is supposed to be more interconnected than ever before, we are clearly shifting towards an individualistic society with no place for a common feeling of belonging to a community or of sharing a sense of personal relatedness…
… what is actually on the other side of this wall of welcome and help.
Is it all visible?
Today, we have decided to raise our voices, to assume our responsibility as human beings to proclaim loudly the urgency of bringing ethical and moral values back. This is not a nostalgic endeavor. This is a crucial decision, just the one that would lead us to prosper together in faith and trust, united in diversity, towards a project of sustainable growth for the Humanity.
But what difference one person can make?
You can´t change the world, but when we stand up together, we can change the lives of millions of people
Let us come together, join forces and work to make our voices heard, standing in solidarity with our fellow humans in the face of hatred. Let us come united and together claim their universal right to live in freedom and dignity.
Come with an open mind to better understand the social, structural and historical inequalities we have inherited and let us get closer and work together to create a more equal world. We are choosing love. Let’s hold hands, connect and care for one another.

 

 

 

Spaceship Solidarity

For the parade, we transform our truck into a space ship: the
“solidarity” brings
and asks for past and present examples of the future – in fog and
bubbles become their occupation and satellites transnational and urban,
resisting
And learn to exchange: from the Hamburg orbit to Berlin: fire up the
solidarity! We’ll come united!

Also musically, we are accompanied from the Hamburg Orbit accompanied by
the Pudel Club and the Silly Walks Sound System.

 

 

BLEIBISTAN

We are an alliance of migrant communities and anti-racist activists who have been fighting for years, partly for months, against deportations.
Some of us have met in the fight against deportations to Afghanistan. In recent months, we have organized successful and visible protests nationwide: the nationwide action day in February against deportations to Afghanistan and demonstrations on Day X of the next collective deportations to Afghanistan. Locally we try to prevent deportations. If we cannot prevent a deportation, we make every effort to try that the deported person can return to Germany.

We decided to have a wagon at the Anti-Racist Parade and CommUNITY Carneval on the 16th of September in Berlin on the subject of “Bleibistan“. Bleibistan is for us a place where no one is afraid to be deported.

For the right to stay for all! Stop deportation to Afghanistan! No one is illegal!

Since December 2016, the federal government has deported 107 people directly to Afghanistan in collective deportation flights. The federal government claims that they would deport criminals to Afghanistan, thus serving racist stereotypes and contributing to the criminalization of refugees. The people affected by deportation are, however, our friends who have gone to school, to work or to the café with us. They have been declared criminals, for example, for the unauthorized leaving of a reporting district or the delayed extending of a toleration.

The fact that deportations have been carried out to Afghanistan shows that the federal government does not care about the “security” of countries and that they use the word only to be able to effectively deport people. We say: That you are concerned about people is as safe as Afghanistan!

Since the terrible attack of May 31st in Kabul, where more than 150 people have died, the federal government has not directly deported to Afghanistan. Their cynical reason was the non-functional capacity of the German embassy in Kabul. Even if no further deportation to Afghanistan has taken place since then, the Federal Government is holding on to deportations and intends to deport to Afghanistan. Both the Bundestag and the report of the German Foreign Office support this despising policy. Our friends and we continue to live with the fear of the next deportation.

At the same time, it can be observed that the foreigners’ authorities are exerting massive pressure on asylum seekers to take part in a so-called “voluntary return” program. In addition, the Federal Government is pushing Afghan refugees through the back door into other European countries, from where deportations to Afghanistan continue.

 People who are threatened by deportations are afraid, they have great fear. They are hurt by despair or take their own lives. Through forced or ill-treatment during deportation, people die or suffer serious injuries. When returning to the country of origin, people are abused, tortured, murdered or disappear without a trace.

 We condemn the horrible deportation policy of the Federal Government.
Every deportation is one too many! Stop the criminalization of refugees!
We ask for a staying permit for all!
There has been war in Afghanistan for over 40 years, Afghanistan is not safe!
We demand an end to deportations to Afghanistan and all other countries!

Come with us on September 16th to the streets of Berlin!
We’ll never give up: ALL STAY!

If you want to contribute to the preparation, write to:
no-deportation@antirassismus.org