Comrades are currently mobilising in the streets to make the eviction as expensive as possible for the cops and the Berlin Senate. Below is today’s announcement by Rigaer94.
This morning, June 22nd 2016, at around 7.30am, approximately 300 cops, private security and construction workers came to our house in Rigaerstrasse 94. First, the construction workers cut out our doors and removed them. After securing their place in the house, the cops, construction workers and security, took position in the garden, the yard and on the roof, as well as in the staircases. Construction workers and cops joined together to carry out all movable objects they could find in the yard – bicycles, a bike shed, fridges, trailers etc. Our doors were removed and the frames knocked out, the phone and internet connection was cut. Only after our lawyer got access to the house, we were informed about the reason for the police action.
According to a press release of the caretaker group for the building, Pawel Kapica, the ground floor including the workshop, the garden, the washing room, the entrance and Kadterschmiede bar should be rebuilt as flats for refugees. These should be “rented out with regular rental contracts within the conditions of Berlin’s normal rent capping as living spaces” (Friedrichshain hilft e.V.i.G. and Moabit hilft e.V. have confirmed in a press release that these rents wouldn’t be covered by the responsible agencies like LAGeSo and Jobcenter, which is the norm in Berlin for refugee housing).
The attic in the front house was evicted as well. After discussions with the cops, inhabitants saved all the things they could still save from the ground level. Everything else was removed and trashed by the construction workers. During this, many objects where stolen by the construction workers and the security. Only a few bikes that people could prove ownership of were returned. Inhabitants of the front house were controlled and one person was taken into custody.
The entire ground floor including Kadterschmiede is now evicted. This means we are losing our communal space; a major part in our communal life is being destroyed. Security is supposed to stay in the house until the completion of the construction work, which would certainly mean regular controls for the inhabitants. We perceive the security in our house as an acute threat for us and for Rigaer Street.
At the moment, only inhabitants that are registered at the house can leave it and come back, which means getting controlled by the cops that are still lingering in the staircases and entrances. The street around the house is blocked off with fences. We cannot see an end of the action yet.
House owners using living spaces for refugees as an argument to evict us is more than cynical. The eviction threat of the queer-feminist wagon-place Kanal is also being justified by the building of a refugee camp. The Senate wants to establish controllable spaces dominated by racist attacks together with house owners and/or caretakers like Kapica, that make a self-organized life impossible for refugees. We won’t let them play us; we are in solidarity with all refugees and will fight for self-organized spaces for everyone, everywhere.
This eviction is the most delirious police action we have seen in a long time. The danger zone we’ve been enduring since October 2015 is a constant threat to the self-organized projects in Rigaerstrasse and the whole Northkiez. The constant attack by the cops and the State have now reached their peak for our project with the eviction of Kadterschmiede.
We are fucking angry, it’s time to explode, make everywhere a danger zone, throw Berlin into Chaos!
Rigaer94 stays untamable!
We will never give up – One struggle, one fight!
German: Rigaer94.squat.net | English translation via Linksunten
Read also: Statement from Liebig 34