Hi William,
I know, this G8 thing is important, but please stop spamming the forum.
1. If you want to inform: do it short or post a link or something like that
2. put your information in a fitting thread or create a new one. You posted that under route and destroyed a discussion with a different theme. Further, no one expects to read about G8 under -route-. Please respect netiquette.
3. Next post like that will be deleted immediately. A forum is to discuss, not to announce
4. Why don't you give your email adress?
This was mailed to me for distribution. There is feedback from the recent carnival and thoughts for G8 organisation. At the end there is also info on arrest rights, visa and registration requirements.
Carnival for full enjoyment pinching tight security in Moscow in the
run-up
against the G8 summit
Anti-capitalist action against the G8 summit in Peterburg (Russia,
planned
for July 2006) has been smuggled into the Moscow carnival yesterday. On
Sunday, 5th of March 2006, some 50 activists succeeded to reclaim a bit
of
the streets implying strollers, by-standers and street poor in a
food-not-bombs action, music, dance, traditional sportive competitions
and
an aborted action with 8 giant puppets ridiculing the ambitions of the
G8
leaders for world rule. The traditional spring burning of carnival
puppets
was prevented by an over-anxious police presence. The mere press
release
indicating an anti-G8-action within the official Moscow carnival called
three busloads of special anti-riot police (OMON) to besiege our
meeting
point next to the Kremlin walls. Our prior mobile recognition unit
monitoring the police build-up managed in time to discretely redirected
activists to the Pushkinskaya public square Metro station, some 500
metres
on. This square has been the site of police-tolerated weekly protests
against the Russian war in Tchechenia for the last three years
(Thursdays
17:30 ? 19:00). For Moscow, the number of activists showing up at the
anti-capitalist carnival ? some in carnival masks - was astonishingly
high,
according to some who initiated parts of the venue. Whereas the
official,
commercial carnival ?open for all citizens? was charging some 4 US $
for
every traditional pancake (blin), our dealing out free pancakes on the
streets of Moscow seemed to come close to a revolutionary measure. Of
all
counter-commercial activities planned and prepared for the in three
preparative workshop sessions the week before, food-not-bombs has
clearly
the best support and experience among local activists. People of
different
age and class background socialised with the slightly student-biased
activist circles, even when pan-cakes were drawing to a finish. It was
these
former outsiders who stood up most firmly against the special police
units,
which arrived on the spot with some 30 minutes delay at 3:30 p.m. and
immediately took to encircling the venue, hunting down people leaving,
dragging and pushing first loads of arrested into readily prepared
prisoner
busses. Surprisingly, the police soon lost its grip on the situation.
?These
youngsters deal out free pancakes and the only thing which comes to
your
mind is to arrest them?, cried some door-keepers who had come over from
a
nearby theatre and had betrayed an extraordinary appetite on arriving
at the
venue. A little child was allowed to stroll through the tight police
lines,
while riot officers exchanged uneasy glances, she was followed by two
activists. Arguments and passive resistance quickly took the mickey out
of
the OMON-police assault and in the end some 80 % activists present
could
escape into the metro. For the 9 (other sources claim 12) arrested
treatment
in the prison busses and at the police station (Bolshaya Dmitrovka) was
rough. Nonetheless, prisoners succeeded in keeping-up mobile
communication
with the out-side, texting (SMS) with the sound of their mobile phones
switched off in spite of police intentions to prevent any messages
leaking
out. In the run-up to the venue, a legal support network had been
organized.
As soon as lawyers made themselves heard at the police arrest the
officers
immediately smoothed their attitude to prisoners. They informed that
the
ground of arrest was ?intent to assemble without permission?. The
arrested
refused to accept the charges. They were released after three hours and
obliged to appear before court the next day. The released however will
not
go to the court. Follow-up actions are planned for the celebration of
the
International Women?s day on 8th of March, including determent
strategies
and more mobile interventions. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Lessons learnt?
Activists from both local and international background involved in the
Moscow Carnival against G8 have participated in the first international
co-ordination meeting against the G8 summit in Russia, which took place
in
Kiev (Ukraine), 17th to 19th February 2006. The action in the Moscow
streets
can be seen as a first test case trying to valorise the joint
discussions
and decisions taken together in Kiev. Therefore, some lessons learnt
merit
detailed scrutiny to proceed in the run-up against the G8 without
repeating
old errors.
To initiate a discussion, some thesis are presented as a result of
initiators of the 5th of March events summarizing their experience. The
thesis have been put down by Marcin following intense discussion with
local
and international activists after the Sunday 5th of March events. They
are
meant as a possible starting point, and by no means as a conclusion to
a
future debate.
1.Combining subversive actions in the public space against the G8 is a
relatively new task for most local activists. It will be necessary to
acquire experience with different levels of provocation and repression
step
by step. This is a process requiring full engagement and vast resources
in
the next 4 months.
2.In regard to repressive organs, some Russian activists tend to saw
paranoia (?you Westerners should know, this is Fascism as you have
never
seen it?? ? hold on, some have seen Genova, though, some Palestine,
some of
us got shot at in Gothenburg, Turkey: don?t be so patriotic the
capitalist
nightmare is a global one). Quite funnily, disproportionate paranoia
among
Eastern European activists is often connected with outright neglect and
ignorance for a viable legal support infrastructure. Experienced
activists
>> from East and West must insist on preparing effective, multi-based
legal
support before any public action. Both should engage to learn mutually
about
the bitter lessons learnt by the other side in resisting repression. No
paranoic vision on police repression can substitute preparative work
for
legal and trauma support.
3.Unfortunately, there is not yet a consensus to ban alcohol and other
legalistic drugs around actions in Russia liable to escalate.
4.International guests should definitely fuse with locals to consult,
plan
and support any step in the Russian public sphere. Even under a Russian
hat,
a foreigner from the West is recognisable at about 50 metres distance.
There is no such common standard of a unified neo-liberal consumer
society
we are used to operate in and against crossing borders in Western
Europe. 5.In Eastern Europe, there is currently no social mobilization
outside of
friendship networks (this equally applies e.g. to Poland and Ukraine).
If
you want to get involved, get friends first. (The concept of affinity
group
would need appropriate translation and trans-cultural interpretation in
the
first place, unless this work gets finally done there is little use to
mention the concept in Russia). Even when overwhelmed by Eastern
hospitality, do not trust everyone everything, the political police has
a
widespread net of undercover cops. Excessive preoccupation or paranoia
around this feature is out of place, local activists have worked out
ways to
deal with the issue low-profile.
6. Dissent in Russia and other former Soviet Union countries uses a
curiously exclusivist anarchist iconography and language. The official
platform of initiatives against the G8 and its ?hallmarks? are
anti-statist
in the first place and anti-capitalist and internationalist only in the
second place. A lot of declarative armoury (?we, Anarchists ? we are in
no
way antiglobalists (the later is not only a bit ignorant in fornt of
the
manipulating power of Capitalist media which has made us recognizable
as
anti-globalist if we do want or if we don?t, it also reflects a serious
concern about chauvinists opposing ?international capital? only?)).
Such
declarations are part of the Russian dissent folklore. The nuance that
swiping anti-government hallmarks are very much en-vogue for
Conservatives
and Neo-liberals alike in countries like Venezuela or Cuba and that
there
are still public institutions to be lost to private capital (such as
principally free health-care in former Soviet countries) has not yet
found a
voice within the Russian discussion. Unfortunately, in parts of the
Peterburg Anarchist scene and the local anti-government radio station
much
less attention is paid on dissociating with local fascists, than on
dissociating with the non-Anarchist social/socialist/non-Stalinist
communist
movement.
7.The current Russian discussions could well sustain some extensions in
topics and methods of exchanging views. Their primordial preoccupation
with
a certain line of so-called ?punk (funny how a word changes its meaning
when
crossing borders)? sub-culture, national political issues and the
general
contempt for the genuinely oppressive Russian line of autocratic
continuity
is mono-structured to say the least. Consequently such discussions
empower
only very few head-figures to speak up. Fortunately and unlike many
other
European countries, a majority of these prominent agents are women.
Nevertheless, discussions lack anti-hierarchic facilitating and general
empowerment to speak up on new approaches to our common tasks. This
applies
to general political debates as well as to down-to-earth action
planning.
8.Discussion hermeneutics in Russian dissent are up to now only varied
by
some occasional imports from Western campaigns. This way, 3rd worldism
has
found its way into ongoing anti-McDonalds-campaigning, as if Russia
were
still a 2nd world apart. A translation of the slogans, promoted in the
West
in the 1980s to the vast pauperisation and brutalisation of Russian
Capitalist society has not yet been achieved.
9.The preparations for a war on Iran are hardly present in the Russian
discussions, the war on Chechnya is understandably top of the agenda.
However, a future Russian-American alliance as pre-figured in the 2001
assault on Afghanistan elapses the critical eye of Russian activists as
well
as the merger tendencies of e.g. Big German and Russian Capital
ventures
(see Schroeder being bought out of government by Gasprom and
Volkswagen).
10.Certain grant organizations lobby their own topics within the scene,
not
without specific material interests and equally not without good
political
arguments (First Aids, environmental pressure groups). They pave a way
of
translating global concerns to local needs and interests. But the
process
should be more mutual, less one-way, less import-dominated and less
hierarchic if we want to gain ground. There is a risk to return to
features
of the one-issue movements of the 1980s while capital is universalizing
its
domination at an unprecedented speed.
11.As the 5th of March action has shown, only a tight symbiosis and
common
language, the development of common interests with ordinary people on
the
street can open up modest LIBERATED ZONES within the public space in
the police
state of Russia.
12.The current Russian-Byelorussian-Ukrainean dissent structure is a
highly
operative network of personal friendships among some 150 activists. The
personilasion of dessent politics bears some brotherly hostility
within,
which - when acted out fully - is able to attain levels of outright
comic
quality, as the first day of the Kiev meeting epitomised. Not engaging
in
this kind of playground personal politics has made the final day of the
Kiev
meeting so productive.
13.The calls to co-operate with some less hierarchic organizations of
the
non-Anarchist Russian social movement have remained isolated.
Curiously
enough, they are still the exclusive preoccupation of a few more or
less
Russian acculturated foreigners. Russian dissent
activists
have taken the habit to refer to the ?Russian Social Forum? scheduled
to
converge in summer 2006 only as ?an occasion to instrumentalise the
infrastructure of them?. There is no detailed analysis of the
contradictions
of interests within the surely problematic ?Social Forum? and its
representative ambitions.
14.Blending East and West can produce fabulous results as long as we
have
time and resources for a process of mutual understanding and learning.
15.This applies to the type of action as well as to the activists
themselves. Locals in Russia are risking life-long confrontation with a
dreadfully pretentious state machine.
16.State apparatus in Eastern Europe are increasingly eager to regain
controll of all aspects of human existence using the latest
achievements of
capitalist socio-technology. Just consider that rumours have it that in
the
run-up to the last visit of president Putin to Kaliningrad, vehicles
with
loud-speakers gave out directives to people cueing up for the sudden
free
release of heroine, which is a business strictly under controll by the
Russian political police.
17.In a system where dealing out free pancakes lets you end up in
police
arrest whereas dealing out heroine seems a state measure for
manufacturing
consent, dissent is not a consumer preference as for some Western
activists,
but a life-option. This explains why the movement for free access to
anti-HIV-drugs has such an important part in the Russian
anti-G8-mobilisation. It means that many different forms and
developments of
dissent in Russia including modest approaches merit respect and
co-operative
support as a potentially serious crack in the world-wide hegemony of
capitalist exploitation.
18.Local activists of dissent are generally over-worked and easily
drawn
into a star-system, building artificial hierarchies based on the access
to
Western grants and resources.
19.In co-operating across the borders we are reciprocally building such
hierarchies of privileged access ourselves, even if Westerners
genuinely
never intended to do so.
20.Our forms of action and human relations are well-advised to actively
counter-balance tendencies forced upon us by the unequal terms of
capitalist
exchange. The invisibly racist hand of the world market has it that
three
weeks? wages in the West can outstrip in purchase power a whole Eastern
European year of work. Social, medical and legal security unjustly
adjust
to this relation. This bias has to be reflected in every aspect of
cross-border co-operation. Materially empowering certain local contact
persons also means founding hierarchies within the Eastern movement
which
might last longer than Western interest in the Russian scene.
(Hierarchies
and its reproductive phenomena are more contagious than radioactivity,
Chernobyl time-outs do not apply).
21.Police arrest is an intrinsic part of anti-capitalist activism in
Russia
(as well as in Scotland 2005, Switzerland 2003 and Genova 2001). If you
are
serious about opposing the G8 you will hardly be able to avoid it (help
your
comrades to avoid it wherever you can, though). The question is how
well you
are prepared to cut police strategies of psychological intimidation
short.
21. Care to get a legal support number ready, reinforce personal
contacts so
that people know and care about you in case you disappear. Russian
police
might not allow you to use a phone once arrested. Once in custody, make
conspiratory use of any mobile phone as long as you hold on it.
Communicate
your name and passport nationality to bystanders when you get arrested.
22.Refuse to make any statement, written or oral, to the police. You
have
the right to do so under section 51 of the Russian penal code (any
accused
or close relative of an accused has the right to protect themselves
from
charges). Instead, you should firmly insist on getting translation (if
needed), getting an official statement under what accusation you are
being
deprived of your liberty and first of all that you have to speak to
your
lawyer without any delay.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
International activists travel information
If you are not in possession of a Russian passport (yet), the following
ideas might be useful to you: -you should have a contact ready to
alarm the embassy of the country which
pretends to have you as its citizen. No matter how much you hate them
and
how little they like us, foreign powers in Russia can cause Russian
repressive organs a lot of trouble. -Maybe you use your first summer
days in Moscow to visit the embassy and
consulates, ambassador?s residences etc. financed by your tax money.
You
could let them know that you are against the G8 and that this does not
mean
that you will resign from your formally guaranteed rights, as our
professional representators fatally assumed without asking us in Genova
2001
and Scotland 2005. The diplomatic staff charged with your legal support
has
names, addresses and emergency phone numbers, circulate them among
activists
of your country. Same applies to national press contacts, special
envoys to
Russia by your national media and NGO contacts. Remember, our
sympathisers
are everywhere. Let yourself be surprised. Have a try. Hate the
official
associates of the enemy with consideration. -whether you act on the
street or back-stage your paper-work should be
irreproachable in three aspects: a) visa, b) migration card, c)
registration
a)visa A standard tourist visa is sufficient to research in the
Cinematographic
archives, get a library card, sit around in posh hotel bars and most
other
activities related with the disruption of the G8. Do not molest your
Russian
friends to get personal invitations. They have more important things to
do. Fake hotel reservations (vouchers) necessary for getting a tourist
visa are
available relatively cheaply. Most tourist companies deal with them on
a
professionalised black market. Take your time. Do not set the dates of
your journey too tightly. Good
preparation and follow-up of events in Russia might exceed your boldest
expectation. Allow for time reserves. Start making the visa months
earlier,
best today.
b) migration card You get this little piece of paper once you cross the
border. Do not be so
foolish as to stuff it anywhere. You are sure to repent its loss, I can
tell
you. Provide for a save and memorisable place. A foreigner without
migration
card cannot officially stay longer than 10 days.
c) registration
Registration is a mere stamp on the back side of your migration card,
which
should be obtained within the first 3 days at a place in Russia.
Formally,
after 3 days in one town no institution except the militia can issue
any
legal registration any more. An unregistered person after 3 days is
liable
to be charged by the militia. You can try to tell stories about having
changed the place in the last days but private and police registration
points will inevitably ask for evidence like tickets, registration at
other
places, etc.
Charging by Russian police can be a lengthy process as corruption is so
widespread among all ranks that officers will carefully scare the shit
out
of you before proceeding to propose a personal settlement. Russians
still
manage to get away with fines around 200 Rubles (4 US $). Negotiation
is
inevitable. Once arrested for political reasons, lack of registration
can be
used as a welcome pretext.
Some exclusive institutions, like Marriott and other places G8
activists use
to frequent rather not with the aim of getting any sleep there, issue
separate registration cards instead of stamping your migration card.
Not
every militia patrol will be acquainted with this and it will need
convincing. Faking such cards could be an option but lack of
professionalism
in faking documents is definitely no option. Any legal accommodation
for foreigners is obliged to register you if you
sleep there. The cheapest such possibility in the capital seems to be
for
800 Rubles (34 US $ a night one place in a 4 person bedroom, at the
?Travel
Guest House, ul. Perejaslavskaja 50@10, Metro ?Prospekt Mira?). What
makes
such places interesting is that they generally deal with registrations
on a
black market basis. For the price of one night, they would register you
for
one week, even if there is no free place available at all, same applies
to
all categories of Peterburg hotels with registration control being
slightly
less tight outside the Russian capital in times of peace.
It is in the interest of activists to dissociate the question of a
place to
sleep from the registration address. Russian activists have a
long-standing
tradition (Kommunalka) of packing their flats with comrades overnight
if
need be.
The actual black market price level for a fake registration is much
cheaper
than official hotels will admit on first discrete contact. In early
spring
2006 it was still possible to get a month?s registration in Moscow for
600
Rubles via tourist agencies who then make fake deals with hotels. As
many
good addresses for fake registrations have been forced to disappear
lately,
such contacts are only to be distributed via personal contacts.
reply
quote
Author: 
msn
