Author Archives: stopg82013

The calendar for events during StopG8 week (8-15 June) is now online. You can check it out here:

https://network23.org/stopg8/calendar/

It is still being added to as we speak, with more talks, films, and other happenings being confirmed. And we want even more! Please email stopg8events@riseup.net if you’d like to run a workshop or organise any kind of event.

Highlights so far include:

** Action days through the week, as well as the J11 Carnival Against Capitalism on Tuesday 11 June.

** “Fighting the Racist Police State” info-evening bringing together groups fighting deaths in police custody, stop and search, state repression, immigration raids, and the prison and detention systems.

** Greek solidarity info-evening on anarchism, anti-fascism, social centres and migration struggles in Greece, and how we can support our comrades fighting on what’s becoming one of the front lines of European struggles against capitalism and fascism.

** Practical workshops, legal info sessions, street action and affinity group training, etc.

** Talks and films throughout the week on anarchism, radical history, international struggles, anti-cuts campaigns, ecological struggles and much more.

** Solidarity benefit parties to open and close the week. “The Word is Power” on Saturday 8 June with Bocafloja from Mexico and loads more, supporting Antiraids and SolFed. “Against Repression” on Friday 14 June with hip hop from UK and Italy: Logic, Caxton Press MCs, C.u.b.a. Cabbal, DJ Steaz, DJ Leleprox and more, supporting United Friends and Families Campaign (against deaths in police custody) and Italian Genoa G8 prisoners Marina and Alberto.

Although there is a lot already happening, we’re very much open to add more events. There will be space for at least 3 events to run in parallel in the convergence centre and other spaces nearby.

In particular, we would really like to have more events to do with:

** struggles of gender and sexuality

** international struggles beyond Europe

** anti-fascism

** anarchism: what can it mean today?

** practical workshops and skillshares

And anything else that fits with our principles: against capitalism, against hierarchy and authority. If you have an idea for an event, check out the calendar and think what time will suit you, then just send us an email to stopg8events@riseup.net and we’ll add you in.

All events except for gigs can be run in the stopg8 convergence centre, which will open on 8 June. The address will only be publicised on opening. In case of emergencies, we also have back-up spaces for events.

https://www.facebook.com/events/527725420619450/

Benefit night Friday 14 June. London: stay posted for venue information.

Logic [People’s Army]; MC C.u.b.a. Cabbal (Militant rap from Italy); Caxton Press MCs; DJ Leleprox; DJ Steaz; and more acts to be confirmed …

ONE COMMON STRUGGLE AGAINST REPRESSION.

The StopG8 week of actions and events ends with a big night of Militant Music. Top hiphop MCs from London and Italy; African sounds; Jungle, Drum n Bass, Dubstep and Reggae through the night.
…
In support of Marina & Alberto – jailed last year for the anti-G8
protests in Genoa 2001; and of families & friends fighting for justice for those killed in police custody in the UK.

Finishing up the StopG8 week in London. See you at the #J11 carnival against capitalism on Tuesday 11 June.
https://network23.org/stopg8/j11-carnival-against-capitalism/

Against state & police repression. Freedom for all prisoners.

All funds raised will go to:

10×100 Years of Jail Campaign in Italy
www.10×100.it

United Families & Friends Campaign (UFFC) in the UK
uffc-campaigncentral.net

StopG8 Network
https://network23.org/stopg8/

Militant music – Hip Hop / Jungle Drum n Bass / Reggae / Dub

From 9pm: Militant Hip Hop. 5£

MC Logic [People’s Army]
www.thepeoplesarmy.org

MC C.u.b.a. Cabbal (Militant rap from Italy)
http://www.myspace.com/cubacabbal

Caxton Press MCs
http://caxtonpresshiphop.com/

More MCs and DJs to be confirmed

D&B till late

DJ Leleprox (D&B old school from Italy)
http://www.myspace.com/leleprox#!

DJ Steaz (dubstep and D&B)
http://www.myspace.com/djsteaz#!

`3w

There will also be an info-evening with talks and information about campaigns from 4PM. More details coming soon.

PS: also check out the WORD IS POWER benefit on Sat 9 June with MC Bocafloja from Mexico. https://www.facebook.com/events/573633195991487/

Two UK anti-capitalists, returning to the country on Sunday May 19 after
attending an anarchist festival in the Netherlands, were intercepted by Kent
Police Special Branch officers at Dover, then detained and questioned for
three hours under Schedules 7 and 8 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Schedule 7 makes it a crime not to provide information to an officer if the
questions are intended to investigate ‘terrorism’. However the activists
refused to provide information, claiming the police’s questions were,
instead, intended to gather information on political dissent.

The focus of the questioning was on the Carnival Against Capitalism being staged by Stop G8 in the West End of London on Tuesday June 11. Continue reading →

There will be a Stop G8 convergence centre in Central London, close to the main actions and the workshop programmes. There will be  sleeping spaces for everyone coming to the mobilisation. We plan to make the space fully wheelchair accessible and a safe space for everyone using it. Food will be available for donations, provided by a team of people’s kitchens, so no one will need to go hungry. There will be a women only space within the convergence centre if people wish to use it. The convergence centre will also be a place to find out about legal support and to get information about the actions. If you have any special accommodation needs or questions about the space please email stopg8 [at] riseup.net.

The convergence centre will open on 8th June and will clear up on 15th June. The location, as well as details of how to get there, will be announced one week before the space opens.

We need everybody’s help to make the centre a safe and secure space. Cops and journalists will not be welcome in the space at any time.

Stop G8 will also have several other spaces during the week of action including a media centre (for non-corporate media, radio, film-making, etc.) and a safe space away from the actions.

Safe Space policy:

We aim to make this space as we want the world to be. We oppose all forms of oppression or domination, including the domination of anyone on the basis of class, race, sex, gender, sexual preference, colour, belief, age, ability, or any other differences. We ask everyone to be aware of their personal privileges and to modify their behaviour accordingly.

Everyone has a right to be respected within the space. Sexist, racist, ableist, homo/transphobia and other oppressive statements/behaviours will not be tolerated and may result in a person being asked to leave.

Everyone has the right not to have their lives affected by substance use. It is our collective responsibility to make sure that nobody is visibly affected by drugs (e.g. alcohol) and impacts negatively on other people. Additionally, meeting and sleeping spaces are alcohol- (and other drug-) free zones. There is a designated smoking area, so please don’t smoke anywhere else in the space.

If you feel uncomfortable or unsafe around another person in the building, please talk to someone from the maintenance crew and ask for support. Be aware of what is going on around you and take responsibility if needed. If you are witness to a violation of the safer space agreement and don’t act, you make yourself complicit in the oppression.

(Pic: Hedge Fund boss John Paulson and friends).

The secretive vulture funds are not best pleased with their addresses being publicised on the J11 action map. According to the Financial Times hedge funds are arranging for staff to work at offices elsewhere in London on 11 June, or asking them “not to dress like a hedge fund manager”.

FT article link: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d94be886-c229-11e2-8992-00144feab7de.html#axzz2U2Lp6a9O

(Also this story in yesterday’s London Evening Standard, in which a lazier journalist calls the police and just cuts and pastes from our website.)

London hedge funds ‘mapped’ by G8 protesters

By Madison Marriage, Financial Times

A number of London-based hedge funds including Man Group and Brevan Howard have been targeted by an anti-capitalist group ahead of the G8 summit next month.

The group, Stop G8, has drawn up an “action map” of what they call the “hiding places of power in the West End”, which highlights potential targets for protesters.

The map identifies the names and addresses of 17 hedge fund companies, which also includes Paulson, Odey Asset Management, Lansdowne Partners and BlueBay.

Stop G8 cites insider-dealing scandals, profiteering from the financial crisis and the short selling of state-owned companies as some of its primary grievances against the fund groups. The protest is planned for June 11, one week before the next meeting of G8 leaders in Northern Ireland.

A partner at one of the hedge fund groups included in the map, who wanted to remain anonymous, says his company is “aware of [the potential protests] and is on top of it”.

He added that several hedge funds have been liaising over how to handle on-site protests on June 11 and have been in contact with the Metropolitan Police regarding ways to deal with the threat.

A senior employee at another targeted hedge fund, who did not want to be named, said his company is “aware of the potential for disruption” and is “evaluating” its options.

He said that the contingency plan may include staff working at offices elsewhere in London on the day of the protest, or asking them “not to dress like a hedge fund manager” on their journey to and from work. “People will take this very seriously,” he said.

A number of smaller London-based hedge funds that have not been openly targeted are nonetheless circulating the map among themselves in case they are affected too.

In an email to members of a group of London-based financiers, the chief operating officer of one hedge fund said: “[The map] is being taken seriously and my understanding is that all police leave has been cancelled in anticipation of trouble.

“Some units who were due to police Northern Ireland have now been instructed to remain in London.”

The Metropolitan Police said they are “in dialogue” with Stop G8 but could not yet confirm how many protesters are anticipated on June 11.(**See NOTE below**)

Man Group, BlueBay and Lansdowne Partners were contacted about their plans to handle the threat of disruption but declined to comment.

Spokespeople for Brevan Howard, Millennium Global and Horseman Capital said they are aware of being targeted but did not want to disclose details regarding contingency plans. Aima, the hedge fund industry’s lobbying group, also declined to comment.

Stop G8 has singled out the hedge fund industry as a significant target, claiming that it “specialises” in risk taking and secrecy while feeding off “blood money” generated by speculation on war, food and debt.

It added that many fund bosses are “big political party donors, which helps them fend off regulation and investigation despite their unsavoury reputations”.

Supporters of the Stop G8 movement, which has local networks in London, Nottingham, Oxford, Brighton and south Wales, as well as links to groups abroad, have been encouraged to “show [their] anger” at these companies’ addresses.

The group, which describes itself as a “network made up of autonomous groups and individuals”, is distributing the action map via Twitter and Facebook . Members of the Occupy London movement are also expected to take part, according to a spokesperson for the group.

Stop G8 plans to publicise the protest abroad, having organised an “info tour” across Germany and Holland over the next two weeks and translating its publicity material into 17 languages.

The map of targets also features the names and addresses of several banks, private equity houses and security organisations, as well as energy, arms, mining and media companies.

A number of exclusive nightclubs, shopping venues and restaurants, dubbed the “dens of the rich”, have similarly been identified as targets for the protest.

Additional reporting by Helen Warrell.

**NOTE**. The Metropolitan Police are not “in dialogue” with StopG8. Unless you count as “dialogue” Community Support Officers sent to knock on the door of our meeting and ask for a headcount, or maybe Special Branch stopping people at Dover ferryport and threatening them with arrest under Schedule 7 (anti-terrorist law) unless they give information on the network. These intimidation tactics have not been, and will not be, successful.

The StopG8 convergence centres will open on Saturday 8 June, and there will be welcome events and talks ahead of the action week that starts on Monday 10 June. On Saturday night we kick off with a benefit gig supporting the South London Solidarity Federation and the new Antiraids network, a network fighting immigration controls and raids in London. Full details below.

Come down to LimaZulu, north London, on 8th June for a night of excellent spoken word, poetry & international hip hop, with a headliner from Mexico! All in the name of an excellent cause, that being the Anti Raids Network ( https://network23.org/antiraids/) & SLSF (solfed.org.uk/?q=south-london/)

South London Solidarity Federation & Anti-Raids Network
e-mail: southlondonsf@riseup.net
Homepage: https://www.facebook.com/events/573633195991487/

With under a month to go now, the StopG8 mobilisation is gathering speed both in the UK and across the Channel. The StopG8 infotour moves on to the Netherlands today (Saturday 18 May), with a talk this afternoon (16.15pm) at the Pinksterlandaddagen Festival

More Dutch dates: Monday 20th – Wageningen: Droevendaal, Droevendaalsesteeg, 16:00; Tuesday 21st  – Groningen: Kale Kip; Wednesday 22nd: Nijmegen, 19:30-20:00 at de Klinker (van broeckhuysenstraat 46.)

Elsewhere in mainland Europe, a group in Germany is mobilising under the banner “Fight G8“. They are supporting the J11 carnival in London, and also calling for actions back in Germany between 14-18 June.

In Italy, StopG8 appeared on Rome’s free radio station Radio Ondarossa to talk about capitalist London, the carnival and the action week. You can listen to the programme (in English and Italian) here. We are also organising solidarity events during the action week to support the Italian comrades imprisoned just last year with 10 year plus sentences for so-called “devastation” during the 2001 G8 in Genoa. More info on that soon. For now, you can read about them here. Love and solidarity to Marina and Alberto!

The StopG8 international call-out is now online in 18 languages: click on the العربية, Türkçe, ελληνικά… tab above to check them all out. If you can help make it 19+, or can help translate the new information text on crossing the UK border, please sign up for the translation list by going to this site and clicking “subscribe”. There will also be a general legal guide for people coming to the UK which will be ready and need translating in the next few days.

SPREAD THE WORD

StopG8 National Gathering @ London 25/26 May

London Action Resource Centre – 62 Fieldgate St  London E1 1ES

StopG8, week of action in London, 10th – 14th June. Get involved! StopG8 is organising a week of action, including workshops, gigs and cultural events in June. There is also a major day of action on Tuesday 11 June in the West End, the ‘J11 – Carnival against Capitalism’. There’s lots to do and we need more people to get involved.

This is the time to come and get stuck in.  We need: artists, rabble rousers, musicians, fly-posters, fundraisers, trouble makers, social media geeks, promoters, kitchen crew, people to hold down a convergence space, and more.

Stop G8 has made an international callout for participation in a week of action from the 10th-14th June in London, leaving space for people to go to Ireland. We are also planning a programme of cultural events to coincide with the week of action and convergence space in London from the 8th-15th June.

We are holding a Carnival against Capitalism (#J11) in the West End of London on 11 June, under the slogan “One Common Struggle”. There are also mass actions planned on the 12th, 13th and 14th of June, see https://network23.org/stopg8/week-of-action/ for a list.

We need your help to make it happen!

To propose items for the agenda, request accommodation in London or for more info please contact stopg8@riseup.net

network23.org/stopg8/

Crossing the border.

If you want to come from another country to join us in London in June, you are very welcome! We have had a few questions from people asking if they may have any problems crossing the border to get into the UK. We don’t anticipate any major extra problems for the G8, but here is some information you might find useful.

If you are an EU citizen:

Britain is not in the Schengen zone, so you will get stopped and asked to show your passport or ID at the border. The police have the power to search you and ask questions. However, according to experienced legal activists, it is very unlikely that you will be refused entry to the UK (unless you are very high profile). If they think that you are coming for the G8, it is quite possible that you will be searched and asked questions, but then let through the border.

In theory, the police do have the power to refuse entry to EU citizens in extreme cases, on ‘public policy’ grounds. They can do this if you pose ‘a sufficiently serious threat to fundamental interests in society’. This can be because of serious criminal convictions, but it can also include your conduct or membership of a particular ‘undesirable’ group. For example, this power has been used against high profile public figures, e.g., Dutch fascist MP Geert Wilders. But legal activists say that is unlikely to be used unless you are particularly high profile: for example, if you have a particularly serious criminal record, or if there is a specific warning about you on a European police database.

If you are not an EU citizen:

Rules for visas for non-EU citizens depend a lot on different countries: you need to check with the Home Office website to see what rules apply to your country. Be aware that it is easier, and fairly common, for the police / immigration officers to refuse entry if you are not a EU citizen. They are likely to ask you to explain why you are coming to the UK, and they may ask you to show that you have money to stay in the UK, that you have a place to stay, etc. If you need more specific information you can also contact us at stopg8@riseup.net.

General advice.

The strongest border controls are usually at airports. You are probably more likely to be checked and questioned at an airport than on the channel tunnel or at a ferry port. Ferry ports usually have the easiest controls, at least if you are coming on foot, on a bike, or in a normal car. If you cross by car on the ferry, it is very common for a guard to just take a quick look at your passport and wave you through without asking questions.

HOWEVER be aware that at Calais and other ferry ports vans, camper vans, minibuses, and lorries are very often checked, as the police are looking for migrants hiding in larger vehicles. They sometimes use dogs, heat and C02 detectors and other sensing devices to check large vehicles. Also, the Eurolines coaches are very commonly stopped for immigration controls.

It is possible that before the G8 summit there will be extra tight checks at the border. If you do not want to be searched or questioned, it is a good idea to travel as inconspicuously as possible. Try to look “normal”, and travel in a normal car rather than in a large group of activists on a coach. Again, it is unlikely that coaches will be turned away, but it is likely that you will be searched and asked questions.

Schedule 7.

The other thing you should be aware of is the so-called “Schedule 7” anti-terrorist law. This gives the police the right to stop and question anyone at the border, without giving you your normal rights under police questioning. That is, legally you DO have to answer their questions, and they do not have to wait for a lawyer to arrive before they question you. They can hold you for up to 9 hours even without suspecting you of any offence. They can also take cameras, computers, and mobile phones and keep them for up to 7 days to collect information. If you refuse to answer questions, they can charge you with a criminal offence.

This law is highly controversial. It is supposed to only be used to prevent terrorism, not to gather information on protests. But the police widely abuse it to try and increase their ‘intelligence’. Some activists have decided to refuse to answer questions, on the grounds that the law has not been applied properly because the questioning was not really connected to terrorism. So far the police have

been reluctant to charge people who have done this, probably because they know they could be criticised in the courts for misusing these powers. But if you decide to refuse to answer questions you need to be aware that you are taking a risk.

If you have problems at the border.

If you have any questions, or if you get stopped at the border and need legal advice, you can call the Green & Black Cross legal hotline. The number is: 00 44 7946 541511

If you do get stuck at the border in France you can also contact our friends at Calais Migrant Solidarity, who can help arrange legal support in France if necessary. Their number is: 00 33 6 45 46 59 86

Wednesday 15th May – Munich, Germany Kafe Marat, Thalkirchner Strasse 102, 8.30pm

Thursday 16th May – Berlin, Germany Rigaer 94, 10pm

Friday 17th May – Bremen, 8pm, Paradox

Friday 17th May- Bochum, SZ, 7pm

Saturday 18th May- Pinksterlandaddagen Festival, Holland, 16.15-17.15 pm

Monday 20th – Wageningen, Holland, Droevendaal, Droevendaalsesteeg, 16:00

Tuesday 21st May – Groningen, Holland, Kale Kip

Wednesday 22nd May – Nijmegen, 19:30-20:00 at de Klinker (van broeckhuysenstraat 46 Nijmegen), Holland