A MOVEMENT WHICH DOESN’T SUPPORT ITS FALLEN COMRADES IS DOOMED TO FAILURE
Anarchist Black Cross - Dijon
E  N  G  L  I  S  H     E  D  I  T  I  O  N
C/o Maloka, B.P. 536, 21014 Dijon Cedex, France. Email : abcu@dds.nl - www.chez.com/maloka
LET’S SUPPORT THOSE WHO’VE BECOME HOSTAGES IN THE COURSE OF CLASS WAR

NEWSBULLETIN #2 – December/January 2001
   Hello !! As you can see, we are a bit late for this issue as we had a wide quantity of incoming information on the last minute which had to be updated. Well, even though it’s already February, we present you our best wishes for this new year which we hope will be another year of  struggle, as it appears currently inside as outside prisons. All our apologize again for our frenchized english but the main thing is that it remains understandable for all english-speaking people. Do not hesitate to ask for clarifications, groups and prisoner contacts, further information, etc. For those receiving this bulletin through email, please reply to the email address mentioned above, not the expeditor’s. As well, if you have email facilities, please mention to us as this new english edition has substantially raised our expenses which we would rather prefer invest for prisoner support (lawyer and campaign costs, political work in prison, publication of their writings, medical care, etc). You can also donate for ABC-Dijon by check for « maloka ». A benefit LP compilation for ABC-Dijon and ABC-Gent is also available for 35ff + 20ff postage. We recall that this bulletin is available for free.
   Furthermore we remind the goal of this bulletin which is definitely not to centralize information but to propose an outcome of the events that take place inside as outside prisons in various countries to keep aware a maximum number of people and prisoners, be they involved in the prison struggle or not. If we intend to get more people showing (international) interests and solidarity with our comrades hostages, if we intend to make prisoners’ situation and struggle known for a greater mobilization, then some basic tools for communication and coordination are needed. 
   As you can see, prisoners’ struggle against long sentences, the closure of segregation units and the release of the sick is still going on in Spain and France. Repression has stroke the anti-prison movement outside as well in Spain in particular where a comrade of us from ABC-Madrid has been framed up and jailed, which expresses state’s determination to wipe out solidarity. We’d like to attend the campaign for his support and call for your mobilization as well, considering that he may not be the last one to be prosecuted for solidarity. Well, have a good reading and see you in 2 months.  
*
INTERNATIONAL STRUGGLE OF THE TURKISH PRISONERS AND TURKISH PEOPLE AGAINST THE INTRODUCTION OF NEW CELLS FOR TORTURE
A couple of facts to sum up the situation :
	On December 19th, while turkish prisoners were entering the 60th day of "the death fast", special police and army units assaulted 20 prisons. The outcome of this operation was : 31 casualties (29 prisoners and 2 warders), 8 people missing and numerous injured. At that moment, 250 prisoners were on hunger strike, a strike that had been initiated by the Guevarist organization DHKP-C, the maoist one TKP (ML) and the stalinist one TKIP on mid-october 2000 to protest against the introduction of "F"type prisons (type which is closely inspired from the  Stammheim prison in Germany and which was set up to detain some of the members of the Red Army Fraction). In the meantime, about 1100 other prisoners from various other left-wing organizations were on hunger strike as well. A week prior to the police intervention, some negotiations seemed to be still possible as a bunch of intellectuals stood as a defender of prisoners' claims faced with governmental pressure. The minister of justice declared then that no new prison would be opened and no prisoners moved until a consensus hasn't been reached regarding medical, judicial and architectural conditions of the new prisons, though he called on prisoners' relatives to persuade them to stop the strike (what shows by the way how powerful prisoners can be when they are united). 
	Faced with the government's purpose to turn over 40-people cells into 1 to 3-people cells, strikers declared that the minister's proposals were too vague and thus claimed the segregation units to be abandoned. At that time, only the prisoners from the PKK stopped their strike "to show good will". Meanwhile, the turkish state had planned to restructure prisons for a long time so as to break off the resistance by prisoner collectives. However, special units had been trained for over a year for this operation and according to the minister of Home Affairs, the fact that prisoners definitely refused to put an end to their strike had been a great opportunity to carry such an attack. 
	Indeed the tension was high a while before and there were a lot of reasons to think of an escalation. A police bus had been attacked in Istanbul and 2 cops shot to death by the TKP (ML), what as a result led the fascist party MHP and the government to launch cop demos all over the country to require harder measures against "terrorists". From that point, prisoner support demos were attacked, contacts between families and lawyers suspended as well as any information regarding the detainees. The DHKP-C declared then : "in respond to all the attacks against our death fast, we're going to turn prisons into burning torches and our bodies into flames of  revolution. Hundreds of inmates are ready".
	Operation "back to life" was the name of the attacked whose goal was, as the minister declared, "to protect terrorists from their own terrorism" but that was certainly not the most clever way to do it. Excavators were crushing down prison walls, army forces were crushing down ceilings with sledgehammers, shots were heard permanently in the background, families and lawyers were brutalized...But turkish people do not bother much about those problems, about what most of them may have seen on TV. The state is right and the state makes them believe that since 1991, most prisons haven't been searched and that prisoners hold kalashnikovs with which they shoot on warders. A prosecutor declared even that some raids were taking place once in a while and as a result, had managed to find out a coupe of self-made weapons. But why weapons ? why death fast ?
	In opposition to the minister's declaration, only 4 people have sacrificed with fire and the rest were murdered during the attacks. While being transported to the hospital, a women whose face and hair were burnt was shouting to the journalists "they put us on fire while alive, 6 women have died". According to other women from the same cell, army forces threw tear gas and blinding bombs into the cells which mixed up different gas and led to fire. The lawyers who managed to see the inmates they were defending reported that prisoners had been tortured, beaten,
raped and mistreated after their arrest. About 300 prisoners are currently in hospital, others have been transfered to other prisons, among them 1005 to "F" type prisons. That means the minister awaited to reach a situation which was tense enough so as to carry the assaults and justify the transfers to the newly built prisons, without going through any kind of consensus.
	"F" type prisons are high security prisons where sophisticated forms of torture are exerted, white torture, by sensory deprivation and other methods of physical and psychological torture which slowly break down prisoners. White torture means slow death and while celebrating the 20th anniversary of the abolition of the death penalty, many prisoners in France express currently through their struggle that modern ways of killing an inmate are no more acceptable. But most western state have understood that white torture was a way for them to wipe out revolutionaries (as we've seen it with the prisoners of the RAF, with the members of AD, etc) without being pointed out as barbaric ones. It seems like the turkish state behaves the same, especially as it is faced with a strong and massive prisoner mobilization. Indeed turkish prisons are famous for the atrocities committed by warders and the penitentiary administration against prisoners and political ones in particular. We'll not forget the 10 inmates who were massacred in Ulucanlar prison for refusing to enter segregation units last September 26th, we'll not forget the 10 massacred the year before in Ankara prison, nor all the murders of revolutionary prisoners which we can't count any more.

Communique of the prisoner organizations
A new resistance is starting ! Hunger strike until death 
	The trembling caused by our resistance through the fast until death will destroy segregation units onto their builders. 
	We'll continue with honour to write down the pages of our history of resistance.
	The assault of the fascist state against us, revolutionary prisoners, enters a new era today with the use of "F" type segregation units. 
	The fascist state has declared from the begining of the year 2000 that political prisoners will be put into segregation units, and has continued the preparation of those units. The segregation units that should be on service since last May could not be set up thanks to the protests of prisoners' families, to revolutionary prisoners and to the public opinion. But this step back of the fascist state doesn't mean that it has stopped its attacks. The collaborating state that couldn't face protests has started a demagogy with expressions of lie. As it pretended, it would change the "anti-terrorist" laws and it would set up some "commissions of prison observation" to slow down reactions and thus legitimate segregation units. The fascist state has tried to break down the public opinion's sensitivity and to make the opposition pacific by declaring that laws for the prison development would be dealt as first during the opening of the national assembly. The laws they make are not clear at all, are very vague and pretend developing prisons. But they do not change the reality of segregation units. On the contrary, they peform the role of a mask to hide the practice of white torture and repression.
	But this mask which has been made holes everywhere doesn't manage to hide reality. The fascist state doesn't say "no" to the "F" type prisons and segregation units. This truth has been recognized for months in the entire world. Thousands of prisoners' mates, of intellectuals, of artists, of revolutionaries, of democrates and of progressists who are against the use of segregation units have been put into custody and tortured. Our mothers hae been beaten up on the way to Ankara prison, on squares in Istanbul just because they were against our cells. In spite of fascist practices, our families and the public opinion haven't left us alone. They were together with us by protesting almost everyday. They called upon the government, the minister of justice. They said that segregation units meant death. They only got as a result white torture and custody. The fascist state has started again to show up its determination. It declared that it would put "absolutely" the cells into practice, that those cells would be "democratic and compatible with human rights". The state has openly declared that it would not give up the use of segregation units. Those who are against the cells and those who are for the cells have both expressed themselves. Now the turn is for prisoners to have the floor.
	We've said from the beginning of this period that it was possible to push back this assault of the fascist state only with a line of resistance that was able to put forward different values. The fascist state who's been kneeling faced with the resistance of revolutionary prisoners for years in the prisons of our country doesn't understand any other language. Once again today, we declare that we'll respond to imperialism and to its accomplices, its lackeys, with the language they understand.
	On the same way as the policy of annihilation of political prisoners into the jails of the fascist junta from September 12th was pushed back,
	On the same way as the declaration of the 1st of August was pushed back,
	On the same way as the "coffin", the Eskisehir prison, was closed down in 1991,
	On the same way as in 1996, with resistance by death fast, the "coffin" of the Eskisehir prison was closed down again, and on the same way as we set up a barricade faced with the attacks against our own people, today as well, we, the revolutionary prisoners, who are facing a similar duty, will continue on the way shown by our martyrs, without hesitation, and will force our people's enemies to knee.
	The fascist state, even if today it shows determination, will knee in front of us, and we'll shout our victory to the entire world. 
	We are determined,	
	Whatever is the price we'll have to pay, we do not fear it. But we'll not enter the cells. The fascist state can massacre us. We can call down as martyrs along the death fast. There can be only one of our comrades left into jails. But even in that situation the fascist state will not be able to put him into segregation units alive. We're going to destroy the cells and their own builders. We will be worthy of our comrades' history who wrote with their blood, with their lives during the death fast, into the prisons of Buca, Umraniye, Burdur, Bergama. We're going to raise barricades with our bodiesw in front of those who wanna put us into isolation cells. Now the voice of our resistance is gonna get some respond into the prisons of our country. Today we declare to all, to imperialism and its accomplices : victory is our history and collaboration must be defeated as capitulation is your history.
	We've never let our history to be dirted and we will not. We're gonna continue to to add pages full of honour to our history. Into this determination we've started since the 20th of October an undefinite hunger strike which will turn into death fast to protest against the assault by the fascist state which is characterized by "F" type prisons and segregation units. We, DHKP-C and TKP (ML), we live the joy to start with this historical resistance and we know that from the begining of of our resistance we've obtained victory.
OUR CLAIMS :
1. The "F" type prisons, which are still being built until now and which aim at the annihilation of revolutionary prisoners, which aim at isolating and at torturing them, must be closed down.
2. The anti-terrorist laws number 3713, which accuse with demagogy the entire people of "terrorist" with all the anti-democratic consequences, which legalize the practice of torture and protect executioners, must be supressed; and not only the article 16 of those laws which constitues the legal stand of the "F" type prisons.
3. The treaty known by the public opinion under the name of "triangular treaty" and which was signed by the ministry of justice, of Home Affairs and of Health, means the supression of prisoners' rights, of their right to be defended and to get medical care, and compel shameful searches to lawyers. This treaty must be supressed.
4. The "Courts for the Safety of the State", which are courts of exception and which have been set up in 1984 must be suppressed with all the consequences it implies.
5. Prisons must be checked by a commission made of doctors from the Order of doctors, lawyers must be chosen by prisoners, families chosen by the prisoners, the representants of the prisoners' families' association and of massive democratic organizations, the representants of the union TU (union of the magistracy), along a certain determined period. This control must be under the protection of the law.
6. The persons responsible for : 
   -our 3 comrades massacred in Buca prison on September 21st 1995
   -our 4 comrades massacred in Umraniye prison on January 4th 1996
   -our 10 comrades massacred in Diyarbakir prison on September 24th 1999
   -our 10 comrades massacred in Ulunalar prison on September 26th 1999
and the people who injured several of our comrades along those attacks, must be quickly tried throughout a trial open to public.
	Those who attacked our comrades, those who raped, those who teared off one of our comrade's arm, those who injured several of our comrades and who gave the order for the assault carried in Burdur prison last July 5th, must be quickly tried throughout trials open to public.
	Our comrades Ugur Sariaslan, Turan Kilic, Yusuf Bag, Mecit Secklin, Riza Boybas, Orhan Ozen, Gultekin Beyhan, Aygun Ugur, Berdan Keimgiller, Iginc Ozkeskin, Huseyin Demircioglu, Ali Ayata, Mudjat Yanat, Ayce Idil Erkmen, Tahsin Yilmaz, Yemliha Kaya, Hicabi Can, Umit Altintas, Halil Turker, Abuzer Cat, Mahir Emsalsiz, Ahmet Savran, Aziz Donmez, Habib Gul, Zafer Kirbiyik, Onder Gencaslan, Ismet Kavakloglu, H. Husnu Eroglu, Mehmet Yalcinkaya, Kalender Kayapinar, Yunus Yaman, Mehmet Batuge, Kadir Demir, Edip Direkci, Nihat Cakmak, Erkan Perisan, Ridvan Bulut, Hakki Tekin, Mehmet Sabri Gumus, Cemal Cam, Ahmet Celik, Polat Iyit, Engin Huylu, Murat Dil, Ugur Hulagu Gungogan, Mustafa Kaya, Kazim Tunc, were imprisoned alive. So as their status as inmates can be acceptable and legitimate in regard of the law and of the people, the state must take on safety of life with guarantee. However the comrades mentioned here above were massacred by the same state. We want our comrades.
7. Our comrades who are sick and those who still have after-effects from the fasts of 1996 as well as our comrades injured by fascist attacks into jails and deprived of medical care must be immediately released.
8. When we were in custody in different places at different dates, we were tortured. Our executioners must be tried and sentenced. The state must give up the protection it grants to executioners by asserting the cases were dismissed.
9. All anti-democratic laws against the liberating and democratic struggle of the people must be withdrawn. The repression against the kurdish people and other minorities must stop.
FASCISM DOWN, UP OUR STRUGGLE !! REPENTANCE DOWN, LIQUIDATION DOWN !! WE'RE GONNA DIE BUT WE'LL NOT ENTER THE CELLS !! UP OUR RESISTANCE !! WE WILL DEFEAT !!
													DHKP-C, TKP (ML), TKIP

	Development of the solidarity outside Turkey
	In reaction to the repression that hit the latest prisoner movement in Turkey, some initiatives were taken from both inside and outside prisons throughout Europe. We would first expose what prisoners have done, among the hunger strike launched by the belgian prisoner Pierre Carette, member of the Fighting Communist Cells, in solidarity with his turkish comrades.

Revolutionary prisoners, communists, anarchists, antifascists, anti-imperialists who signed the platform of June 19th, 1999 on hunger strike in solidarity with their comrades on hunger strike in Turkey !
Communique #1

	« On Thursday 20th, December 2000 I'm going on hunger strike in solidarity with the 800 revolutionary prisoners in Turkey (members of the DHKP-C, of the TKP (ML) and of the TKIP) on hunger strike against the penitentiary policy of the turkish government. This one has undertaken a program for the construction of confinement/modualr prisons based on the west-european model and has started to put revolutionary prisoners into confinement. 
	Segregation has become the governments' main weapons against revolutionary prisoners for both its short-term effects (preventing prisoners to attend political life) and its long-term effects (destroying prisoners' mental health). As prisoners of the Fighting Communist Cells, we were subjected to it for 3 years from the end of the year 1985 to the end of the year 1988, and we only managed to get out of it by fighting along hard and lengthy hunger strikes.
	This solidarity strike is an opportunity for me to implement the principles contained into the platform of June 19th, 1999 : it is a step towards the elaboration of a fighting community in between revolutionary prisoners, communists, anarchists, antifascists and anti-imperialists against the imperialist prison (system).
	This solidarity strike, as well as the comrades' strike in Turkey, is also an expression of our rejection of any chantage for repentance and renouncement. It is the expression of communists' willingness to fight imperialism always and everywhere, its system and its projects until peoples' liberation, until communism, within the conditions which are proper to the prison system.
SOLIDARITY IS A WEAPON* ! NO REPENTANCE NOR RENOUNCEMENT : NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE ! UP THE STRUGGLE OF REVOLUTIONARY PRISONERS IN TURKEY ! UP THE COMMUNIST REVOLUTION! ».
							Pierre Carette, prisoner of the fighting communist cells, Leuven prison, December 20th, 2000
* Pierre Carette had run a hunger strike on the end of July 2000 in solidarity with the turkish prisoner Fehriyde Erdal, member of the DHKP-C, who was then on hunger strike as well and detained in Belgium, threatened by extradition to Turkey. This act of solidarity by Pierre Carette was also considered by himself as his engagements towards the principles of the Platform. The hunger strike of both comrades had prevented as a result the extradition of the turkish militant. 

Pierre Carette : Centraal gevangenis, Geldenaakse Vest 68, 3000 Leuven, Belgium.

Here follows a declaration by Joelle Aubron, member of Action Directe, in solidarity with the struggle of revolutionary prisoners in Turkey :

	« On December 27th, 2000 we were ending with the tray meal strike we had started on the 20th to express our solidarity and concern for the struggle launched by prisoners belonging to several communist organizations in Turkey. 
	By responding so to Pierre Carette's call, member of the Fighting Communist Cells detained in Belgium and who signed together with us and a hundred of revolutionary prisoners the Platform of June 19th, we thought it was important to catch attention on this new and massive hunger strike widely ignored by medias but also the militant press. 
	In the meantime, the grim reality was known by all : on December 19th, the turkish government was carrying an assault against nearly 20 prisons. While reading various newspapers and listening or watching other medias, the turkish state's propaganda is clearly avowed. Its lies are spread over in 2 waves.
	Calling "back to life" an army operation which had as a result nearly 30 casualties is not only cynical. This tittle would intend to hide how putting an end to the hunger strike was a pretext for an operation planned for a long time. Elite units had been training for months in the scope of carrying this assault. Since January 2000, a governmental treaty had planned to start with those brutal transfers. Several times, the minister of justice had annouced they would begin in August. 
	Ten years ago on May 9th, 1990 a delegation made of turkish officials visited the sadly famous Stammheim prison. The goal then was already to conform the treatment of political prisoners in Turkey to the european norms of destruction by white torture through solitary confinement. Since then, while "F" type prisons were being built, the pressure of the repressive machine against prisoners has kept on increasing.. The new prisons are made to break off solidarity and organization which for prisoners constitute basic weapons to resist destroying conditions of detention,  warders' brutality and survive the violence and tortures exerted in police stations, during extractions. Along the years, a more and more important topic of successive turkish governments' penitentiary policy has been to end up with collective cells where prisoners help each other. 
	In 1996 already, the struggle had had to go through the death of 12 hunger strikers before a previous government defers the systematization of its confinement policy against more than 10000 political prisoners. The governmental perspectives to reach the standards of the european union have regularly had as a result some attacks and persecution of militants' groupings.
	Bucca, Umraniye, Diyarbakir, Uluncalar, Burdur...as many prisons as raids since 1995. In September 1999, 10 militants were murdered during a force operation, on July 5th and 25th, 2000 two other attacks against collective cells took place.
	The second wave of propaganda consists in creating confusion. Collective cells are described as lairs of the Mafia where drugs, weapons and mobile phones would circulate and offer the possibility to continue lucrative trafficks from the prisons. In the meantime where the government was planning to grant amnesty to various accomplices caught-on-the-fact, it tactfully excluded from it the wide majority of the militants who had been sentenced by the Courts for the Safety of the State. The reality of the links between the turkish state, the Grey Wolves*, the islamic militias terrorizing the population from Kurdistan and the Mafia are not to be shown up any longer. We would pass over the impunity of state employees who torture and rape into police stations, who kill demonstrators. Again on December 10th, a young man who was sticking up posters in support of the struggle was killed. Short before their demonstration starts, it was the turn of mothers and families, artists and actors protesting again and against the policy of confinement and the impunity of executioners to be brutalized, put into custody and tortured (...).
	The turkish state failed. Last December 24th, he minister himself was compelled to confess that 2018 prisoners were still going on with the struggle amongst 353 engaged in the death fast. At the same time, his propaganda to sell out this operation as a humanitarian action hasn't got the success he was hoping.
	Before the assault, there was a multiplication of initiatives in various european countries, The Netherlands, England, Belgium, Greece, Switzerland, Austria, France... (...). On December 16th, about 50 prisoners in Germany, Holland and France had already fasted on their own, until 20 days for one of them. Pierre Carette's call to materialize the collectivity invested in the Platform of June 19th has raised the plitical consciousness of a common struggle.
	If the governments of the European Community and the french minister of Foreign Affairs in particular show compassion for the massacred carried by the turkish forces of order, we do not forget that the same governments are the models of the penitentiary policy which is being set up by the turkish state. After all, if the method is "appalling", the third millenium basically consists in applying the dispersion policy which have already been successfully achieved in various european states. One remembers the hard struggles run by the communist and bask prisoner collectives since the 80's under a spanish government that was knocking at the door of the same European Union. Encouraged by years of sentencing, the turkish power thinks it can be faithful to the old sermon "no matter the bottle is as long as we get the intoxication".
	This "democratic" intoxication gives the opportunity for those responsible for the worst injustice and inequalities, for those causing war, for those starving and opressing entire peoples to criminalize those who still dare contesting their monopoly over our lives.
	For several months, bask, breton and corsican prisoner collectives have been struggling in french prisons to be grouped and repatriated at the same time as they claim their rights as political prisoners.
	We are also engaged into a process of struggle. Since December 14th, J-M. Rouillan is on hunger strike for political grouping and the release of the comrades whose condition is not compatible with detention (see « repression in Lannemezan prison ») ».
								Joelle Aubron, for the Action Directe's prisoner collective
* The Grey Wolves is an extreme right-wing organization closed to the turkish government. It was built up during the second world war by the colonnel Turques, fan of Hitler, and advocates the superiority of the "turkish race" over minorities such as the Kurdish. It is very active throughout Europe and often commit murders with the protection of the turkish state which enjoys the annihilation of revolutionary militants. 

	In marge of the prisoners having signed the Platform of June 19th, 18 inmates have launched a hunger strike in Innsbrück, Austria, to oppose the introduction of "F" type cells. 10 are on undefinite hunger strike and 8 are doing a turning strike. The strikers declared they would not end their movement as long as the turkish government doesn't accept their claims, i.e. the interruption of the construction and the transfer of revolutionary prisoners to "F" type cells. Other prisoners in Belgium and Germany, more isolately, have also supported the struggle of revolutionary prisoners in Turkey by various initiatives of solidarity.
	As well, a demonstration actually took place in Innsbrück, Austria, last December 9th, 2000 against "F" type cells and the violation of human rights in Turkey. About 300 people attended this demonstration. 

Turkish fascists murder in The Netherlands
	On saturday 9th, December 2000, turkish human rights activists held a hunger strike next to the town hall of Rotterdam, The Netherlands, to protest against the torture and persecution of political prisoners in Turkey. This was to be the day where the member of the anti-repression movement was to be killed. Indeed, the strikers who were standing into a tent were attacked by a gang of 30 to 40 members of the extreme right-wing organization "Grey Wolves" who stabbed to death one person, Cafer Dereli, and severely injured another one. The attack was quick and well-organized. It took 3 hours for the dutch police, usually quick to intervene during left-wing/radical demonstrations, to arrive on the city hall square. Indeed, the strikers had been already targeted several times by the city hall of Rotterdam, especially when media started to show interest for the strike. 
	According to the collective Mocakauk which focuses on the Middle East topic, some authorities in the netherlands subsidize or support anyway the Grey Wolves. One main factor would be their common involvement in the NATO as indeed, the Grey Wolves are part of the turkish coalition government which plainly supports the NATO. The Grey Wolves had performed a great role in disrupting opposition during the 1999 Yugoslavia war when leftist Turks and Kurds in Holland helped organizing protests. We could add to this argument the fact that the turkish minority, biggest minority in The Netherlands, is definitely anti-kurdish and have complete faith in the turkish government, in addition of the influence performed by groups such as the Grey Wolves. They feel attacks on their government as an attack against themselves, just have to see the clear barrier which is held between Turks and Kurds and the reprisals which follow pro-Kurditan demonstrations there. This context is not only profitable for the dutch state to fight against PKK militants on its own territory and prevent kurdish immigration. This climate of terror that it allows is a way for it to avoid large-scale pogroms by denying its help to Kurdish who are a few, at the same time as it doesn't compromise its situation with the other members of the NATO who are for most of them, and Turkey as well, great political and economic partners. A week before the murder however, the Amsterdam police had found that Grey Wolves perform a big role in narcotic traffick and had seized illegal drugs and weapons at their Heaquarters in Amsterdam. But as each of us can guess, this was basically an operation carried in the scope to perfect, as it is the tradition, the image of the sadly famous democratic dutch state...and for politeness towards the public opinion as well as its closed partners so as everybody is happy and doesn't complain.
	After the murder in Rotterdam, more supporters of the hunger strikers rallied against fascists by surrounding their tent and protect them from possible attacks. A demonstration was actually planned on December 10th to commemorate the death of Cafer Dereli.
For further infos on the events in The Netherlands, please contact the Critical Archive of the Middle East, Central Asia and Caucasus at : 
Mocakauk, P.O. Box 15 727, 1001 NE Amsterdam, NL. Email : mocakauk@dds.nl

To conclude about this chapter on the struggle of revolutionary prisoners in Turkey and the solidarity which was organized with them, we thought it might be interesting for some of you to publish the list of the prisoners who signed the Platform of June 19th as well as the 5 chapters constituting the basic reasons for which those prisoners have united throughout this platform. This platform is actually updated every 6 months.

Platform of June 19th, 1999
Chapter 1 : Text of the Platform of June 19th, 1999.
1. The signatories of this platform are all revolutionary militants, communists, anarchists, antifascists or anti-imperialists detained in the prisons of the imperialist bourgeoisie for their political and/or military-political activities. Over their political and ideological divergences, they mean to constitute a fighting community within and against the imperialist prison system. They hope this initiative will have some respond from the forces outside prisons. Solidarity is a weapon !
2. The signatories notice that the reasons which have brought them to struggle against the imperialist bourgeoisie, its States, its alliances, its national fractions, its army and police forces, etc, are far from disappearing and are more mandatory than ever. Injustice, misery and oppression have never ruled at this point over humanity as masters. The economy of markets' rules plunge everyday deeper peoples of the world into destitution. The neglection of numerous peoples' national rights, racism, sexism and the ecosystem devastation participate in this global crushing of humanity for the profit of a handful of well-to-do. One is right to revolt !
3. The signatories reassert through this platform their attachment to people's side and to the struggle against oppression and exploitation. No matter if the organization to which they were belonging at the time of their arrest still exist or not, they do confirm the legitimacy of this struggle. Over all the possible differences of strategy and tactics, over all the discussions regarding the opportunity of such or such way of struggle at this or that moment, the signatories assert that resorting to violence is legitimate against exploitation and oppression, for the social and popular liberation, for the conquest of a fair and brotherly society. "No justice, no justice !".
4. Consequently, the signatories refuse and denounce any chantage of the "release for repentance" type, of the "release for dissociation" type, of the "release for collaboration" type, etc. The signatories may have a critical look at their militant experiences, but this critical look only concerns and must only be useful for the movement of popular and social liberation. They refuse then to make of this possible critical look an object of transaction with the bourgeois device, considering that it will only use it against the movement of popular and social liberation. No repentance nor capitulation!
5. The signatories have all benefited from outside support, of an active solidarity into their respective countries and sometimes over. They call all forces and all people who stand by to take note of the fighting community they constitute, to reflect this fighting community into their own support activity, to develop cooperation and unity in between them. Defending one of us means defending all of us ! Attacking one of us means attacking all of us !

Chapter 2 : List of the prisoners who signed the platform of June 19th, 1999. In between paranthesis : the original organization, the sentence being served or required, the place of detention (which obviously may have changed since the edition of this platform).
ABDALLAH Georges Ibrahim (Lebanese Revolutionary Army Fractions, life, Lannemezan prison), ACAR Suleyman (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Canakkale prison - Turkey), AGRI Dogan (TKEP/L, life, Umraniye prison - Turkey), AKYUZ Ahmet (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Umraniye prison - Turkey), AUBRON Joelle (Action Directe, life with 18 years of "safety", Bapaume prison - France), AYDIN Dogan (DHKC-DHG, Fleuris-Merogis prison - France), AYDIN Remzi (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Hasdal prison - Turkey), BALMON CASTELL Jose (PCE(r), 30 years, Sevilla II prison - Spain), BLAIR John (irish socialist republican, Risley prison - England), BOZDOGAN Aysun (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), BROTONS BENEYTO Fransisco (PCE(r) and GRAPO*, 30 years, Sevilla II prison - Spain), CABADAN Serpil (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), CABEZA MATO Luis (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Herrera de la Mancha prison - Spain), CALCERRADA FORNIELES Javier (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Ocana I prison - Spain), CALCERRADA FORNIELES Leoncio (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Ocana I prison - Spain), CALERO ARCONES Joaquin (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Herrera de la Mancha prison - Spain), CAMENISCH Marco (Swiss anarchist militant, 10 years + threatened by extradition to Switzerland, Novara prison - Italy), CARETTE Pierre (Fighting Communist Cells, life, Leuven prison - Belgium), CARMONA TEJEDOR Manuel (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Herrera de la Mancha prison - Spain), CELA SEOANE Fransisco (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Salamanca prison - Spain), CELA SEOANE Jesus (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Badajoz prison - Spain), CICEKLER Ergul (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), CUADRA ETZEANDIA Enrique (PCE(r), and GRAPO, 30 years, Sevilla II prison - Spain), DAGDELEN Onder (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), DEMIR Emrah (DHKPC-DHG, Fleuris-Merogis prison - France), DIEGUEZ SILVEIRA (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 16 years, Sevilla II prison - Spain), DONOS PULIDO Jose Juan (GRAPO, 24 years, Herrera de la Mancha prison - Spain), DORIGO Paolo (communist prisoner for the construction of the Communist Fighting Party, 13 years and 6 months, Biella prison - Italy), DURMAZ Huseyin (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), ERCAN Ayfer (TKEP/L, life, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), GARCIA ARAMBURU Josefina (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Soto del real prison - Spain), GARCIA RUEDA Ana (GRAPO, 30 years, Avila prison - Spain), GARRIDO GONZALEZ Joaquin (PCE (r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Sevilla II prison - Spain), GHIRARDI Bruno (COLP*, 23 years, Opera prison - Italy), GHIRINGHELLI Marcello (Red Brigades, life, San Vittore prison - Italy), GONZALEZ CAMBEIRO Alfonso (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Salamanca prison - Spain), GONZALEZ RODRIGUEZ Concepcion (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Soto del real prison - Spain), GUBKIN Igor (MRC* and Communist Work Party, in custody since August 3rd, 1997, Lefortovo prison - Russia), GUVENILIR Nuran (TKEP/L, 15 years required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), GUVENILIR Resat M. (TKEP/L, sentenced to death + life, Umraniye prison - Turkey), HAYTA edat (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), KARATAS Musa (TKEP/L, life, Umraniye prison - Turkey), KARTOGLU Serif (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), KOYUN Ibrahim (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), LEON LARA Encarnacion (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Avila prison - Spain), MENIGON Nathalie (AD, life with 18 years of "safety", Bapaume prison - France), MOUESCA Gabriel (Iparretarrak*, 42 years, Arles prison - France), NARVAEZ TERNERO Rosario (GRAPO, 30 years, Avila prison - Spain), OKSUZ Hasan (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), ORTEGA Laureano (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Madrid II Meco prison - Spain), ORTIN MARTINEZ Jose (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Madrid III Valdemoro prison - Spain), OZAT Umit Onursal (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), OZTURK Ibrahim (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Umraniye prison - Turkey), PADROS COROMINAS Mercedes (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Avila prison - Spain), PEIRAT Yves (Francs-Tireurs Partisans, on trial on February 6th and 7th, 2001, Baumettes prison - France), RADCHENKO Vladimir (MRC, in custody since February 22nd, 1998, Lefortovo prison - Russia), ROBLIN Gael (Emgann*, in custody since May 4th, 2000, Sante prison - France), 	ROMERO VEGA Maria Jesus (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, Avila prison - Spain), ROS DIAZ Francisco Javier (GRAPO, 30 years, Herrera de la Mancha - Spain), ROUILLAN Jean-Marc (AD, twice sentenced for life with 18 years of "safety", Fresnes prison - France), SAT Cem (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Malatya prison - Turkey), SAT Cuma (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), SCHIPTSOVA-ROMANOVA Larisa (Moscow anarchist Club, in custody since February 2nd, 1999, Krasnodar prison - Russia), SCHLEICHER Regis (AD, twice sentenced for life, Moulin-Yzeure prison - France), SERDAR Vefa (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Canakkale prison - Turkey), SIMON QUINTELA Jaime (GRAPO, 30 years, Puerto de Santa Maria II prison - Spain), SKLYAR Valery (MRC and Communist Work Party, in custody since November 13th, 1997, Lefortovo prison - Russia), SONMEZISIK Serhat (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Umraniye prison - Turkey), SURUCU Sibel (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), SURUCU Zuhal (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), TAYBARAN Kenan (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Gebze prison - Turkey), TEMEL Necdet (TKEP/L, over 25 years required, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), VAZQUEZ BAUTISTA Guillermo (GRAPO, 30 years, Herrera de la Mancha prison - Spain), VAZQUEZ GOMEZ Roxelio (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 27 years, Madrid III Valdemoro prison - Spain), VURAL Elif (TKEP/L, life, Canakkale prison -Turkey), YAS Baki (TKEP/L, life, Canakkale prison - Turkey), YERDELEN Erbakan (TKEP/L, 20 years required, Umraniye prison - Turkey), YILDIRIM Ismail (TKEP/L, life, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), YILDIRIM Mutlu (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Canakkale prison - Turkey), YILMAZ Ali (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Canakkale prison - Turkey), YILMAZ Muharrem (TKEP/L, 12 and a half year, Bayrampasa prison - Turkey), YUCEL Songul (TKEP/L, death sentence required, Umraniye prison - Turkey).
List of comrades having signed the Platform and who've been released since then :
ALEXANDRE Annie (Libertarian Communist Organization, 15 + 6 months, released on December 1999), CAYETANO NAVARRO Carmen (PCE(r) and GRAPO, 30 years, released on January 2000), SASSOYE Bertrand (Fighting Communist Cells, life + 8 months, released on July 2000), VANDEGEERDE Pascale (Fighting Communist Cells, life, released on February 2000).
*GRAPO (Antifascist Resistance Groups of October 1st) - COLP (Communist Organization for the Liberation of the Proletariat) - MRC (Military Revolutionary Party), Iparretarrak (bask revolutionary armed organization), Emgann (movement of the breton left separatist).
*
BRITISH JUSTICE'S PERFECTING IN MISCARRIAGES...
Freedom for Ray Gilbert ! 18 years of injustice is enough !
	Ray Gilbert is an english prisoner who was framed for the murder of John Suffield and the robbery of his betting shop in Liverpool on March 13th, 1981. The attack consisted in an armed robbery by 3 men along which John Suffield had been stabbed to death as he was unable to reveal them the safes codes. Three inquiries had been undertaken to discover the identity of the robbers and on December 16th, 1981 Ray was found guilty of murder and eventually sentenced to life imprisonment by the Liverpool Crown Court. The 2 other accused were given 6 year for robbery so as to run concurrent with Ray's sentence, which implied Ray's complete responsability for the murder. 
	However Ray has never stopped to claim his innocence in this affair and has fought to make it recognized since the very beginning of his wrongful imprisonment. Indeed there are serious reasons to doubt of his innocence : he was not identified by any of the eyewitnesses, the destruction of custody records by the english police, the witholding of 205 statements by the prosecution during the trial and until now, the fabrication of evidence by the police and various inmates including remands for prisoners to testify for shorter sentences, the absence of forensic evidence to link any of the accused to the crime committed, etc. Thomas Pickett, who was then prisoner at HMP Risley and prosecution witness in the court of 1981, even revealed that his statement was fabricated by the police. It then took 7 years to the Home Office to look into this "controversy", which may seem normal (!) but which can let us think that the convictions are unsafe, especially considering the difficulties made to Ray to expose his innocence.
	Ray has fought for over 18 years so as to obtain all relevant documentation on his case and get the opportunity to prove his innocence. According to him, the police and the justice look for protecting their informants and collaborators to ensure his wrongful conviction. Indeed, one more working class person imprisoned "rightfully" or wrongfully doesn't cause much trouble to the british justice which persues this old tradition by all means, as well as its western partners. In 1993, the justice team lost all Ray's legal documentation and to cumulate obstacles to prevent his attempts of contestation, the criminal case review has refused to send his case back to appeal without "public explanation", though his co-accused were eventually released on appeal. To conclude, Trial and Error unearthed someone who confessed his involvement in the murder to the police 6 years after but as he refused to confirm his confession, the Merseyside police and the Home Office rejected it as such. Undoubtedly, right or wrong, they seem to confine with Ray's conviction without worrying but for the unquestionable authority of their justice system and the persecution of their class enemies.
	Ray's attempts to get support or attention from the media and various politicians have failed up to now. The only support he's got until now has come from the ABC network in Britain which he's attached to thank for its devotion. He definitely refuses to take part in the parole process as he considers himself as a victim of gross justice and that clearing his name from that crime is more important to him. As a result of his determination, he's spent over 18 years in detention while he may be free by accepting what the class justice want him to be : a murderer and a submissive citizen. 
	In the meantime, you can send protest messages to the chief of british justice to remind him that regarding his case or Mark Barnsley's, it has serious troubles with reviewing its "errors", especially when it has some interests to win out of them. You can require as well all Ray's legal documentation to be hand over, protest for the justice’s refusal to grant him appeal and the difficulties made to him so as to prove his innocence.
-Jack Straw Home Secretary, Queen Anne's gate, London, SW1H 9AT, England. Email : gen.ho@gtnet.gov.uk
You can also overwhelm your local UK ambassy with phone calls, pickets, etc...
For further infos on Ray's case, go to www.bgriffiths7.freeserve.co.uk/ray.html or contact his support campaign at Mr G. Summers of Mgrathand CO, 52/54 Maddox Street, London, W1R 9PA, UK. 
Ray Gilbert : M10111, HMP Woodhill, CSC “A” unit, Tattenhoe street, Milton Keynes, MK4 4DA, England.

Mark Barnsley back in segregation and transfered as he refuses parole !! 
	On the 8th of December 2000, Mark Barnsley was invited to apply for parole for the second year running. Following the harsh repression Mark has suffered along the past few months, "ghosted" from prison to prison, british justice still expected from him to break down and pushed him again into repenting by proposing parole. However, as the target of the incredible conspiracy he's been victim of for nearly seven years now, Mark rejected the offer. As he stated previously "I'm an innocent man and freedom is my right, I'm not prepared to compromise myself by submitting to any kind of conditional release. If that means spending extra years incarcerated in top security prison, then it is the price I'm prepared to pay, albiet regretably. My life has been completely destroyed by the terrible injustice I've suffered, all that I have left are my principles and integrity, and I am not prepared to compromise them by bending my knee to the parole board".
	Latestly, several action actually took place in support of Mark. One only has been reported up to know. Indeed on December 19th, 20 people entered the Crown Prosecution Services (CPS) offices in Sheffield in protest of the continued imprisonment of Mark and the witholding of vital evidence from his defence. Entrance was gained easily by some smartly dressed people, and then everyone run inside and upstairs to occupy upper offices. The invasion and occupation caused much disturbance and CPS workers were left with no uncertainty about the strength of feeling about this miscarriage of justice. Leaflets were given to all the staff stating : "the CPS have framed up Mark Barnsley ...they would like to think that he doesn't exist but we won't forget...If they won't release the evidence then we will just go look for it ourselves".
	Unfortunately, the police station is next door to the CPS building so the police arrived very quickly to eject activists. A banner proclaiming "Free Mark Barnsley" was hung right outside the building so passers-by could know what was going on. The local press was also in attendance and thus could witness the arrest of 16 people while others managed to get away. The arrested people were held for up to 10 hours and all charged with "conspiracy to burgle, with intend". They were bailed to appear at Hull Magistrates on January 9th as they cannot be prosecuted by CPS. Unfortunately we haven't been communicated the results of this court case but according to Mark's support campaign, CPS staff were supposed to be present and had to explain themselves about all the evidence they have been witholding in Mark's case, in public !! More infos on that in the next bulletin.
   In the meantime, Mark has been taken back to segregation along with 2 other inmates, accused of "fermenting dissent" and "organizing a protest" in the prison where he was ultimately transfered (HMP Frankland) after a long succession of "moves". They were actually segregated under the « Good Order and Discipline » (G.O.A.D.) rule. The prison has still been unable to come up with a single incident, which would support this allegation. Since there has been absolutely no 'trouble' on the wing and not even a hint of 'unrest' amongst the prisoners, it would seem that officials at Frankland  have acted in this illogical way out of paranoia. It's now very clear tous that Mark and the others were segregated for no legitimate reasonwhatsoever. The officials at HMP Frankland are actually intending to move him to another prison but it doesn't manage to find one which is prepared to receive him. The Home Office has told them to put Mark back on the wing there, unless they can give a good reason to move him out. Frankland then formally charged Mark with 'fomenting unrest on the wing' and more specifically 'planning a protest'. Since Frankland have offered no evidence to back up their claims, we can only conclude they are keen to get rid of Mark  because of his campaign, which continues to attract support. Half an hour  before being put into segregation, Mark received a letter from Rob Cave, one of the Editors of  'The Big Issue', saying that he had booked a visit with Mark to discuss his case. Is this just a coincidence?
   Mark's protest on his wrongful imprisonment as well as his refusal to apply for parole have caused much trouble to the CPS which makes up false accusations against Mark to justify this treatment and his return into solitary confinement. This conspiracy has lasted for nearly a year now and the CPS' behaviour towards this miscarriage of justice has been constantly hardening faced with the widening of the mobilization in support of Mark. Indeed, an increasing number of people, including comedians, has got involved in the campaign for his release internationally, working on making his case known to the wider public and carrying actions. But Mark Barnsley was framed up and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment as he was and still is an active working class political activist, which implies that fussy political interests are at stake through his case, such as the political and class "neutrality" of british justice. The CPS in particular has an image and its authority to defend and keeping up with the victimization of Mark has been the way it's intended to achieve this goal, even though this is the way it has engaged a political conflict. Mark paid the price of it by his resistance and won his dignity, but in marge of its relentlessness on him, british justice has much to loose. The actions carried against its official representations in various european countries regarding Mark's case basically must have been hard to swallow for its autocracy and the results it expects from it. Up to us to make it swallow more, let's keep on harassing it!
   Last information !! : Despite the efforts of the campaign and supporters to get Mark put back on the wing at HMP Frankland and the ridiculous charges of 'fomenting unrest on the wing' dropped, Mark Barnsley was moved out at 5.30am on Thursday, February 1st. He is currently at HMP Wakefield. This is Mark's 20th prison move so far. As Wakefield is primarily a high security prison for sex offenders it is certainly one of the worst places they could send Mark and clearly a punishment move.
    On arrival at Wakefield, Mark was put in an unheated Segregation cell with only one blanket (outside the temperature was below zero). Later, in what can only be seen as an act of provocation, Mark was told he was being put on one of the wings, in a dormitory with sex offenders! Not surprisingly he refused and was again sent back to segregation; this time on a charge.
    HMP Wakefield runs a very 'tight' regime and it's dungeon-like Segregation Block is notorious for it's strict rules. At the time of writing, Mark's living conditions have not improved at all and he is still being denied access to his property. If you'd like to send Mark a message of support, for the moment it would be best to enclose only one envelope and an IRC with your letter and a few pieces of paper so he can write back. Publications have to be sent in directly from the publisher. Everything else, such as stationary, has to be bought from within the prison. Anything else sent to Mark will be withheld.
Mark Barnsley, WA 2897, HMP Wakefield, 5 Love Lane, Wakefield, WF2 9AG, England.

WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP.
   Unless we increase the pressure on the authorities NOW, we expect things to get even worse for Mark. It is clear that this latest move to Wakefield is a cynical attempt to set him up for further punishment. We urge supporters everywhere to flood the officials below with phone calls, faxes and letters as a matter of urgency. The Governor of HMP Wakefield especially, as he has the ultimate responsibility of moving Mark to another prison.
   Please do all you can to demand that Mark's horrendous living conditions be immediately improved and that he be given access to adequate facilities and his property. Stress that HMP Wakefield is clearly not a suitable place for Mark. That it is outrageous that he is being expected to live with sex offenders. That he has not been classed as a security risk prisoner so should be sent to a lower security prison. Demand politely that Mark be moved immediately to another local prison where he will not be isolated from his family (for example the lower security, Cat B. training prison, HMP Garth in Lancashire).
   Letters, faxes, phone calls, etc should be sent to the following:
-Martin Narey, Director General of Prisons, Prison Service HQ, Cleland House, Page street, London, SWT 4LN, England. Fax : 0207-217-66-64.
-Peter Atherton, Director of High Security Prisons (same address). Fax : 0207-217-66-64.
-Bill Bade, Director of High Security prison (same address).
-David Shaw Governor, HMP Wakefield, 5 Love lane Wakefield, WF2 9AG, England.
	Please send letters and emails to your local ambassy as well as to British Home Secretary Jack Straw and Home Office Minister Paul Boateng , to express your support for Mark's struggle for justice and demand that he personally see to it that Sheffield Crown Prosecution Service hand over to Mark's lawyers the large quantity of evidence which they have been unlawfully witholding since 1994 :
-Jack Straw Home Secretary, 50 Queen Anne's Gate, London, SW1H 9AT, England. E-mail : gen.ho@gtnet.gov.uk.  
-Paul Boateng Minister of state, Home Office Queen Anne's Gate London SW1H 9AT, England. Tel: 0207-273-4000. Fax: 0207-273-2190
Please forward copies of any replies to: barnsleycampaign@hotmail.com For more information on Mark's case, go to www.appleonline.net/markbarnsley/mark.html or to www.freemarkbarnsley.com or write to Justice for Mark Barnsley : PO Box 381, Huddersfield HD1 3XX, England or to ABC-Dijon. A very complete pamphlet "Beaten up, fitted up, locked up" exposing his case is also available at our address for 20 ff + 4,20 ff postage (free for prisoners).

   On Tuesday 20th February, from 1-2pm, the Justice for Mark Barnsley Campaign will be holding a picket at the Prison Service Headquarters in London, to protest the continued segregation and harassment of miscarriage of justice prisoner Mark Barnsley. They demand an end to the harassment of Mark Barnsley
and that he be taken immediately out of segregation and moved to another local prison. For those who are travelling or living around London please come along and support this picket at the Prison Service HQ, Cleneland House, Page Street, London, SWT 4LN (nearest tube St James Park or Westminster).

   We publish down here is a text written by Mark at the attention of the Anarchist Prisoners' Legal Aid Network (APLAN) which we found particularly interesting. The APLAN is a prisoner-guided initiative formed to provide legal aid and outside support for imprisoned anarchists. This support is provided in the spirit of mutual aid and solidarity in the struggle, topic about which Mark had to express his views and which is plainly related to the Platform of June 19th, 1999 which appears above :
	« Dear comrades,
(...) I've been a revolutionary anarchist for most of my life and active in the movement since the age of 14 (25 years ago). Nonetheless, my first allegiance is to my class, and as a working class militant I increasingly find I have little in common with some people calling themselves anarchists. I say this to make it clear that I don't regard anarchism as any kind of sacred cow. Nonetheless, while it may be devalued by middle-class lifestylists and liberals, the term Anarchist still has a meaning.
	Over the past 25 years I've participated in many struggles with good comrades who didn't call themselves anarchists, even fought (i.e. in armed combat) alonside with them. I've been involved in prisoner support work for about 23 years and in that time most of the people I've supported were not anarchists. During my terms of incarceration, my comrades have rarely been anarchists, a few of the ex-cons who support me are anarchists.
	Obviously the prison struggle, and the wider struggle outside, is about more than anarchists, and it's going to take more than our pitifully small numbers to change the world. 
	As anarchists we presumably try to get prople to see our point of view about the way things are. But we don't say they have to "convert" before we'll give them a helping hand, that would be the worst form of opportunism.
	There are many prisoners (anarchist and non-anarchist) throughout the world whose struggles we, as revolutionaries, should be highlighting and supporting.
	If proposing the formation of a new prisoners' organization, I would certainly not be suggesting it to be limited to anarchists.
	However, having said all the above, I see absolutely nothing contradictory in what Chris Plummer has said. To suggest that it is somehow sectarian to limit an anarchist organization to anarchists is ludicrous. Some of the arguments put forward seem to confuse anarchism with liberalism.
	During my long years in anarchist organizations it has never stopped me dealing with people who weren't anarchists, of helping my neighbours, or going to their aid if they needed me. Some life any of us would have if all we did was associated with bloody anarchists !
	If, for example, a group of people set up an organization in support of the Palestinian struggle, does it mean that they're turning their backs on the Irish struggle, and on all other anti-imperialist struggles ? Of course not, it simply means that they are concentrating their resources in a particular area, and by supporting one anti-imperialist struggle they are in fact supporting anti-imperialism per se.
	Many anarchist prisoners have received a shameful lack of solidarity from the movement outside. By beginning to address that shortcoming, by setting up a mutual aid network to support our own political internees and by anarchist prisoners establishing lines of communication between ourselves, does that mean that we're being elitist, that we're turning our backs on other prisoners ? I don't think so.
	Really I'm on the periphery over here on Airstrip one, but I think you're going to need to sort it out if APLAN is an anarchist organization, or if it is not. There seems to be a need for a specifically anarchist organization over there, not least since anarchists prisoners are currently targeted. If APLAN is going to include all-comers (and it has the resources to support all of them effectively), perhaps you should change the name.
	For what it's worth, my own suggestion is that APLAN is a network of avowedly anarchist prisoners (that's not just any clown with a circled "A" tattoo either) working to spread anarchists ideas and offering political support for the struggles of all prisoners. We should work with other prisoners, but keep APLAN anarchist.
	There's a great deal that we can achieve together, but I think that if APLAN becomes too diverse on terms of its membership we'll be loosing more than we gain, not least in terms of our collective strength and cohesiveness. As anarchist prisoners I'd guess that every single one of us is working class, and such is the state of the anarchist movement these days that makes us so damn unusual. I'd also guess that most of us think there's a fair bit wrong with the movement, and with its relationship to the prison struggle. But we shouldn't just be asking what the movement can do for us (particularly the comrades who were never previously part of that movement), but what we can do for the movement. Forgetting about our more immediate and pressing concerns for a moment, together we have the potential to form a pretty good "Think Tank" for putting ideas back into the movement (something which has been a long and proud tradition among imprisoned activists). Rather than being enhanced by a wide range of (non-anarchist) political opinion though, I actually think the quality of the debate would suffer as a result of it. I also think the organization would suffer in general.
	Being anarchist prisoners gives up a level of integrity and coherence that a politically disparate (and perhaps politically confused) group would have in terms of addressing the wider movement.
	Those are just a few ideas, and while there are some more things I'd have liked to bring up, I think I've already occupied enough space already. So I'll leave it there for now. Always on struggle » - Mark.
*
GREECE : THE ANARCHIST MOVEMENT KEEPS ON CULTIVATING THE CULTURE OF INSURRECTION
	We publish here some information which appeared in the magazine A-news that reports most of the political events and actions by the anarchist/social movement in Greece. The following chronology relates to solidarity with prisoners, repression of "illegal" people and various direct actions which occured along December :
-3rd : some anarchists occupy a radio station in the suburbs of Athens and make solidarity speeches for about 20 minutes about the anarchist prisoner S.Seisidis (imprisoned since the 1st of August for a bank robbery without evidence).
-9th : public intervention with loudspeaker in Thessaloniki in solidarity with the prisoners Mitropetros, Seisidis, Maziotis, Lesperoglou and turkish political prisoners on hunger strike.
-13th : anarchists from Thessaloniki occupy Radio Observer's studios and express their solidarity with the inmates and group of inmates mentioned above on the air.
-14th : 25 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Patras. 
As well, a demonstration takes place in support of turkish prisoners on hunger strike attended by many anarchists in Athens. Clashes occur with the police after an attempt by one of their car to go through demonstrators by force, nearby the turkish ambassy. 2 people were arrested and at the end of the demonstration, cops attack and arrest 4 turkish people who were on hunger strike in Athens centertown.
-15th : 28 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Aegan. The anarchist K. Mitropetros, who was accused for the riot-demo from the 18th of June, 1998, is taken out of charges by the court after appeal. 
-17th : 150 inmates from Koridallos prison revolt. Some of them had sewed their mouth as a protest against their coming deportation.
-19th : 5 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Samos. In Athens and Thessaloniki, demos take place against the "back to life" operation by the turkish government against political prisoners on hunger strike. A bank agency is attacked with stones and molotov cocktails. A communique to a newspaper says "a group of anarchists takes the responsability for the attack against the bank agency in Akadimias street in solidarity with turkish prisoners' struggle against white torture cells.
-20th : 7 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Kastoria.
-21st : the offices of the canadian multinational TVX Gold are set on fire in Thessaloniki as the trial on appeal against Nikos Maziotis is coming soon (see further). TVX is trying to take power over the Strymonikos' gold mines, which has led to an uprising of the local population there as well as the militarization of the area. Nikos Maziotis was actually charged for a bomb attack against the ministry of development in solidarity with those people's struggle.
Anarchists make an intervention with loudspeaker and boards at the polytechnic school in Athens in solidarity with the prisoners Seisidis, Lesperoglou, Maziotis as well as turkish prisoners on hunger strike. An american car is set on fire in Glifada (suburb of Athens. The action is claimed by the group "Black Star" "in solidarity with turkish hunger strikers".
-22nd : solidarity demonstration with prisoners' uprising in Turkey. At this point, 20 inmates had been murdered and hundreds of others injured while the transfer to "F" type cells has already started. 
-25th : Nikos Maziotis, A. Lesperoglou and Kostas Kalameras start with a 5-day symbolical hunger strike in solidarity with revolutionary prisoners in Turkey. This strike is as well a reaction to the greek state's similar intention to introduce segregation units. They stated then :"As those who remain silent are accomplices and as we would be shameful not to react faced with the massacres that took place in turkish prisons. As the globalized repression of the New Class is showing up and as the scientifically ellaborated cruelty of "F" type cells imported from Germany and the USA is working in great collaboration with turkish militaries' cattle. Those plans are being achieved as well in Greece with the "A type special confinement cells" operation in Maladrino (...). We refuse to accept this reality passively and as prisoners, our only possibility is to start with a 5-day symbolical hunger strike so as to share the struggle with our turkish and kurdish comrades".
-27th : 17 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Agio Nikolao and in Patras.
-29th : 93 "illegal" immigrants are arrested in Thessaloniki.
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Nikos Maziotis' trial on appeal
	As we were telling you in the previous bulletin, Nikos Maziotis, anarchist militant sentenced to 15 years for a bomb attack against the ministry of industry and development, had lodged an appeal which was eventually postponed on January 8th for a trial which lasted a week. We are still waiting for an official confirmation but according to several greek anarchist collectives, Nikos would have been released. For what we know, the court case was the ground of an expressive class confrontation as Nikos threw his microphone on the judge right on the first day of audience as he didn't let him speak. As for the rest of the audience, Nikos was chained hands and feet and had to be carried through the court room by a couple of cops so as to prevent our comrade from doing the same offence as the day before.
	Hundreds of insurrectional direct actions had been carried in solidarity with Maziotis so a lot of pressure was weighting over this appeal as indeed the deal was to put an end to this solidarity in return of Nikos' discharge. As to admit the failure of the greek state to control agitation around Nikos' case, the court fianlly chose for reducing his 15 year sentence to a 5 year one, and as Nikos had already served 3 and half year by cumulating the time he spent in detention and custody, he was then releasable. According to some greek comrades, Nikos would have been released on Monday 15th, January 2001 but again, this requires confirmation. On saturday 13th, on the week-end of the trial, a police station was attacked with molotov cocktails by a group of anarchists an hour before a concert starts, most probably in solidarity with the convict. 4 police cars were burnt down and a couple of the cocktails reached the main target. 6 people were arrested a bit later but apparently released without charges...
*
SPAIN : INTENSIFICATION OF PRISONERS' STRUGGLE 
Communique of the solidarity coordination 
	In the first half year of 2000, 7 casualties and 29 cases of torture were registered in the prisons of the spanish state. In addition of the 24 casualties and 63 cases of torture counted along the 9 first months of 1999, 7 other casualties and the 16 cases of torture were registered during the last 3 months.
	The prisons of the Madrid community have reached the top for mistreatment. 21 cases were denounced in 1999 and 8 in the first 3 months of 2000. This "performance" is closely followed the comunities of Castille-Leon and Andaloucia. The majority of complaints is cumulated in Duena, Soto del Real and Teixero prisons. The coordination precises that the real number of cases is far higher than what is officially registered as all prisoners do not have the possibility to make their case known. This report includes as well the information communicated by the european council and Amnesty International regarding torture in the spanish state. 
	The european coucil, through the Prevention Committee of Torture, made a report following its visits in the prisons of the spanish state in 1997 and 1998. This report was made public on April 13th in Strasbourg (France) and exposes the information collected by the Association against Torture. The european report denounces the persistence of mistreatment in police departments by the national police, the guardia civil as well as the bask autonomous police forces (beatings, sexual attacks for women and asphyxia with plastic bags over the head). The committee investigated the case of the ETA militant Josu Arkautz Arana who was mistreated by the guardia civil along his detention in 1997. The european organization actually registered his complaint as taken into account whereas it had been denied by the guardia civil and rejected by judge Balthazar Garzon. It warns about the slow time of transmission of prisoner complaints for mistreatment and about the high number of judges from "the penitentiary watch"who do not visit inmates who require it (...). 

Undefinite hunger strike of prisoners in the spanish state
	This situation in spanish prisons, above the denial of other prisoner's rights (regarding long sentences, defence, etc) and the use of FIES isolation units to repress prisoners' resistance, is part of the numerous reasons to fight the reality of life behind the walls. The collective and undefinite huger strike which was launched by about 50 prisoners on December 1st is however determined by 3 demands basically which are actually the same as those claimed by the prisoner movement that started in November 1999 :
1. The end of FIES isolation units
2. The end of dispersion 
3. The release of prisoners with incurable diseases.
Another 150 prisoners are taking part by solidarity actions such as the refusal of the courtyard exit, etc as many inmates have suffered from various health problems since previous strikes and are not fit enough to join the undefinite one. We do not have however any clue about the current situation.

1. F.I.E.S (Fichero de Internos de Especial Seguimiento) is a coercive measure of illegal character which has been unsuccessfully denounced on various occasions, even though it is contrary to the spanish constitution as it compromises fundamental rights. FIES was introduced by the penitentiary institutions in 1991 to ensure the security and the good order within penitentiary establishments. In reality, FIES is a lot more than a database. Prisoners who fall under the FIES regime are basically isolated 23 hours a day in their cell and spend one hour of daily exit in the court yard. Their communication with the outside world (family and friends) is strongly restricted as well as the supply of paper to write and of books to read. The only physical contact they have comes through the beatings they get from warders. 
The FIES regime is a total contradiction with the official aim of serving a sentence, namely "social reintegration". 
2. Dispersion is not a measure that only affects political prisoners as they wanna make us think. This is demonstrated by the fact that more than 52% of the prisoners in the spanish state are serving their sentence outside the province of their social surroundings. The fact that contact with the outside world and visitors is difficult, can provoke a strong personal and social disorder. Effects contrary to the aim of imprisonment, which is, according to the spanish constitution, "social reintegration". The demand of the prisoners to put an end to the dispersion only asks for the fullfilment of constitutional laws.
3. The demands to release the prisoners with incurable diseases only requires the basic right to die with dignity rather than being doomed to die in a cold cell or in a room of the prison hospital. 11,3 % of all the people who've passed through Catalan prisons along the past ten years have died inside prison (1700 people), despite the fact that a lot of prisoners are released from the prison a few days or even a few hours before they die in an attempt by the penitentiary administration to reduce the mortality figures within prisons.

The undefinite hunger strike has been going on for 2 months and a half and until now, we haven't got more clue about the situation. The mainstream media and the institutions concerned have done nothing more than to criminalize and repress those organizing solidarity outside in an attempt to link any initiative of solidarity with FIES prisoners on struggle with the ETA, which has led to the imprisonment of several militants (see "repression of the anti-prison movement"). If the situation continues like this, the prisoners taking part in the hunger strike are going to die or end up with serious health problems as after 3 weeks already, the first irraparable effects appear.
Therefore, any initiative of solidarity to support their struggle is definitely needed. You can organize actions at your local spanish ambassy or send an email or a fax to the following officials :
-Ministro del Interior : estafeta@mir.es
-Ministro de Justicia : webmaster@mju.es
-Director Gral. de Instituciones Penitenciarias : mar.hedo@dgip.mir.es
-Conselo General del Poder Justicial : webmaster@cgpj.es
-Defensor del Pueblo : registro@defensordelpueblo.es
-Gabinete Tecnico de Ministerio de Interior : +34-913-354-050
-Direccio General de Serveis Penitenciaris i Rehabilitacio (DGSPIR) : +34-932-140-156
It is important to mention the 3 demands, your name or name of your collective and of the country ! Please confirm if you have sent an email or fax by writing to to the following email address : crustaci@hotmail.com

Undefinite hunger strike of the anarchist italian prisoner Michele Pontolillo - communique
	« From December 7th, 2000 at miday, I'll start an undefinite hunger strike.
	Considering the persistence of the highly repressive situation that occurs inside as well as outside prisons, and with the legitimacy which I am given by the inalienable right to rebel against the omnipotence and the arrogance of those ruling, I inform you that I'll start an undefinite hunger strike at miday o December 7th, 2000 for the reasons exposed further.
	For a couple of years one can observe an important raise of the european imperialist states' repressive action aiming at criminalizaing and reducing the activism of political and social movements, amongst the anarchist movement's which is deep-rooted in countries that went through continuous working class and revolutionary struggles, as it is the case of the spanish, italian and greek states. If one watches the panorama, one's view is upseting. The restructuration of capitalism, motivated by the large-scale use of telematic technologies, has opened new contradiction which governments will hardly manage to make up through consensual policies. States and by extension the whole society have been attached to adapt to capitalism's requirements, each time more excluding.
	The dicrease of production costs, the raise of unemployment, the flexibility and the precarity of work have caused the immediate proletarian situation of numerous social groups that were traditionally closed to middle-class. The employment of an underclass coming from Third world countries, the dismantling of the well-being state on which social agreement was established are all conclusive aspects of a reality that calls upon an unpredictable future for those who take part in the production process, between proletariat and bourgeoisie, and who've remained squeezed between the slavery of work and the fear of unemployment, but otherwise turned towards a radicalization of class conflicts. 
	The uncertainty and the unpredictability of the future, the high number of those excluded from the production process at the same time as they border destitution and subsistence, are criticizing the exploitation system. The french writer Jacques Attali describes with an overwhelming realism this new scenario which is developing at high speed in western countries :"what is sweeping away in Europe and elsewhere, if it's not a certain way to think of the social order, is a completely new capitalism which is about emerging, a global capitalism which will deeply modify connections between nations of the world. A capitalism motivated by new forces which will give birth to a new elite and which will push the whole of traditional classes into a proletarian situation. Quickly they will not be wage-earners any longer but a wide downgraded proletarian class. A great "super-class" will rule over the "downgraded". Faced with a worrying social radiography, the states show serious difficulties to preserve consensus around their institutions and popular protests. This is demonstrated by the fact that some of these clearly stand apart the official action line followed by "working class" parties and unions (which have been domesticated and become dedicated waiters of bosses), electing new forms of autonomous and self-managed struggles. So what's the recipe chosen by states to hold back general discontent and the radicalization of social struggles, within toleratable limits ?
	No more no less than relegating all the repressive power needed to its repressive forces so as to counter this emerging situation, with an obsessive and paranoiac approach regarding the improvement of machinery dedicated to the "anti-terrorist struggle" and "the order and the law"... Political euphemisms for the control and the annihilation of all real, potential or virtual dissidents. The fact that this repression resorts or not to its war instruments (police, sticks, iron bullets, justice frame up, arbitrary detention, etc) depends on the expansion of class struggle.
	The wide development of all those powerful means of repression and coercion which the state has spread over lately is in everybody's sight. This is an objective sign of the intensification of the conflict occuring between exploited and exploiters. The first casualties of the state are naturally rebellious proletarians who've become aware of their situation as exploited and oppressed and those directly engaged in the struggle against Power and all its expressions. 
	Among the rebel proletariat are anarchists, unsubmitted to the state and capital and providing a political and social project experimented in socialist thesis according to which workers, only producers of the social wealth, can and must emancipate from the bourgeois capitalist domination
so as to rule their own lives and future once and for all. 
	Those who know the principles of anarchism even basically know that anti-authoritarianism and anti-capitalism fund the anarchist theory and practice. 
	Anarchists are avowed enemies of any hierarchy, of any taxation and domination, no matter its origin and its name, making the praise of life and freedom, of people's and individual self-determination; we hope for a self-managed society as a basis on which we could build up a new libertarian and more fair world.
	It is so, when the proletariat is preparing to take initiatives faced with his desires of emancipation, like I saw it many times along my existence, the state is takes away the mask it wears and shows its real despisable face, violent and criminal, which is for many disguised with liberal and democratic ornaments. The methods to which the state resorts to end up with proletarian revolts are known by all : its hands dirty with innocent blood. 
	In my memory I recall the vile GAL, the spanish-bask brigade and other armed gangs organized by the state which spreads over fear and terror among the population observing lifelessly how those who had questioned and fought against it fall after each other. As well we remember in Italy the bombs on Palza Fontana in Milano or at the railway station in Bologna which caused the death of hundreds of people, some facts that haven't been highlighted yet until now, the time that time runs and consumes these awful tragedies. The italian state is only prepared to recognize the involvement of some of its secret agents into those barbaric and criminal acts. However, in spite of all those who're willing to overshadow it, we know the truth : the bomb attacks were planned and ordered from the high arenas of Power : it was state terrorism which tried doggedly to change and to turn over radically the truth by causing the death of hundreds of innocent people in the hopeless scope to counter the proletariat's uncontrolable revolutionary offensive.
	More recently, the italian state brought a wide number of anarchists before the sacred courts, charged them with taking part in an armed organization as unlikely as grotesque, hierarchically structured, containing chiefs and officers as well as operative comandos. All that was accompanied by a strong criminalization campaign that brought about a real anarchisthunt.
	The one who wanted to speak highly of revolution or libertarian communism or who had contacts with anarchism was systematicly persecuted and imprisoned. Incarceration didn't drag on providing results, taking the lives of Soledad and Edoardo, dead becuse of the state's "holy spirit operation" while they were confined into those inhumane prisons. The situation hasn't changed. The state keeps on using frame up as a weapon to blow out the fires of the proletarian resistance which come out where contradictions are the most felt. It is the case of 3 fellow anarchists from Madrid who are charged with sending some of the parcel bombs to each one of the journalist working for the most reactionary spanish press.
	The operation was elaborated and commissioned, as usual in those cases, from the Home Affairs' offices. The provincial information brigade, as we may call it, the political police made sure that convicts deal with the justice authorities responsible for sending them directly into prison where one learns what distress, misery and unpower mean. Proves ? Maintaining relations with rebellious anarchists and proletarians imprisoned.
	However, so as political frame up has the effects expected, it needs fundamental ingredients such as public lynching, the personal and political mistrust of the convicts as well as the moral condemnation of their acts, of their way to be, to feel and to think.
	The state's communication means perform a crucial and decisive role in this scope, preparing the ground so as repression can act with impunity, taking the responsability to criminalize and slander individuals, groups and collectives considered as inconveniant and disturbing for the Power. 
	The game is one of the most snicky ones we may imagine : journalists point out and accuse, judges sentence and prisons execute.
	Those teachers for mass consciousness, so busy with proving the unprovable, i.e. that society as it is organized is the best one we ever had. Excellent manipulators of reality and unequalled artists to turn it over, they call upon the false and slanderous "freedom of expression", upon media lynching covered by the "right to inform". By labelling as terrorism the active solidarity operated by political convicts locked up for life into those extermination camps belonging to capital, those teachers cover up acts of torture and murders committed daily in police stations and prisons, cover up the annihilation of rebellious proletarians into isolation units wearing the FIES label, dispersion, slow death and agony of prisoners suffering from incurable diseases in terminal phase, while finding protection in the omnipotent and dogmatic "State of Right"
	Faced with this scenario which we may qualify as Dantesque without falling into a drama, there are 2 behaviours left : blind submissiveness to the capitalist domination or spontaneous and passionate rebellion against all that oppresses and exploits us as slaves.
-closure of isolation units and abolition of FIES (File for Internees on Special Follow up).
-end of dispersion
-immediate freedom for all prisoners with incurable diseases
ALL PRISON WALLS DOWN !!! UP ANARCHY !!!
Michele Pontolillo, prision de Villabona (M-7), 33 271 XIXON, Spain. 

Laudelino Iglesias' hunger strike : struggle versus slow death
	As we were telling you in the previous bulletin, Laudelino had started an undefinite hunger strike in order to obtain his conditional release as he already served 20 years, which is the maximum time one can serve in detention according to the spanish law. Laudelino is a spanish prisoner original from Barakaldo and registered as FIES. The reason why he's actually refused his release is that the penitentiary administration intends to keep him 20 years more because of the sanctions he's cumulated along the past 20 years in jail. 
	Therefore, Laudelino had launched a hunger strike last October 21st and had to bear the reprisals of the administration for his resistance. All along his strike, he was maintained in segregation and banned of visits while receiving a vey superficial medical follow-up, besides frequent transfers and cell searches. His only contact with the outside world was then by phone conversations through which he could give information about his situation. The 3 main reasons for the exceptional treatment he was subjected to were that "laudelino is on touch with organizations using violent means to obtain satisfaction, that he receives and uses publications spreading false and manipulating information which may affect the good order of the establishment or the security of its staff". 
	In short, our comrade was wrong to reclaim his right for conditional release and to fight against a penitentiary administration that is more and more required to perform a repressive role because of an agitated political and social context to which contribute prisoners' struggles. But this administration as well as the conservative media collaborating with it still have the traditional excuse to which they resort when they have to justify arbitrary repressive measures, wether inside or outside prisons as we can see it currently with the case of Edoardo Garcia Macias. Indeed, the administration fears that "some inmates know or feed contact with ETA members or associations affiliated to this bask radical world that maintains a warlike behaviour against the institutional order". Obviously, authorities work hard on inventing connections between any protest movement that goes a bit too much out of the toleratable limits and the ETA so as to create a context of fear and confusion that allow them afterwards to run criminalization and repressive campaigns. You know "terrorism", this old recipe that can always be useful ?
	Outside, Laudelino was supported by local radios that read his communiques on the air as well as by the Amaitu Platform which had organized solidarity actions. As well, an inhabitant from Laudelino's original village had started an undefinite hunger strike in solidarity but after 45 days, Laudelino decided to put an end to his strike for health reasons as he couldn't stand up any longer and had sight disturbances. 
	However, reprisals had to follow those acts of resistance and on January 10th, Laudelino was transfered to Villanubla prison instead of Langraitz prison where he had asked to be transfered so as to be closer to his social surroudings. The transfer took place "normally" though Laudelino still has headache because of his hunger strike that lasted one month and a half. Besides, the Amaitu Platform was refused to visit him and his mail is now even more censored so as to cut him oof from his sympathizers. Laudelino declared anyway that he would take part in the collective
prisoner movement according to his physical condition.
You can write to Laudelino (better in spanish) at : Laudelino Iglesias, C.P. Villanubla, Modulo 7, Carretera Adanero-Gijon, km 94, 47620 Villanubla, Spain. 

Repression against the anti-prison movement 
 STOP THE FRAME-UP AGAINST ANARCHIST IN MADRID !!!
	Last November 8th, 2 fellow anarchists, Eduardo Garcia Macias and Estefania Maurete Diaz, were arrested in Madrid and accused of sending 7 parcel bombs to 6 journalists and one politician aiming at criminalizing the movement in solidarity with prisoners' struggle against FIES isolation units. Proves of their innocence were witheld without any justification so as the media could spread over their lie propaganda which linked once again those attacks to the ETA as it is the tradition in Spain everytime a direct action of this type takes place. Anybody who's involved in the movement of solidarity with prisoners outside is systematicly suspected to be part of the ETA, which has recently led to a wide investigation against the anarchist/radical/squatter movement.
  The main proofs for Edu’s conviction are his relation with "dangerous" anarchist prisoners and 40gr of firework powder supposedly found at his parents flat (where he lives). The witnesses of the inspection declared the powder wasn´t there, and supiciously the "discovering" of the powder doesn´t appear in the videorecording of the inspection (which the police has "lost"!!). His public activity made absolutely incompatible with a parallel clandestine one. What is more, after capturing the supposed author of the bombs, 4 more have appeared.
   In the meantime, Eduardo, 22 year old, is held in segregation under the yoke of repressive forces which are determined to persecute those involved in the solidarity movement with prisoners as it tends to represent a serious threat for the political and social order outside. The charge of « terrorism » was then an appropriate accusation for that purpose as Eduardo’s and his fellow’s arrests express the willingness of the spanish state to cut off communication between prisoners and the streets. Considering the numerous direct actions carried outside in addition of prisoners' mobilization itself (struggle against FIES, Laudelino Iglesias' hunger strike, bask prisoners' struggle for their grouping, etc), the spanish state has many targets to hit and intends to make force exhibition through its victims. 
   As Eduardo has been involved for a long time into prisoner support work and particularly into ABC-Madrid, he's now paying the price for it. The state has choosen Eduardo García because he is one of the best-known anarchists in Madrid and aside from ABC he has also been involved in other social struggles; mainly in the squat movement and "anti-globalization" actions and groups (he went to Prague with Madrid group). He visited prisoners almost every week, supporting them and helping to coordinate their strikes. He legalized many of the demostrations taking place in Madrid and took part in some direct actions to make public the prisoners situation (such as climbing on famous places of the city or appearing nude in front of the jail department).
   ABC-Madrid is starting with a wide campaign to free their comrade as he may risk until 20 years of imprisonment. This victimization of Eduardo is an attack against the entire prisoner support movement in Spain and an escalation of the repression through similar arbitrary arrests and convictions can be feared. Therefore, comrades from ABC-Madrid call all prisoner support groups and individuals internationally to carry actions towards their local spanish political and economic representations to show solidarity. It has already produced stickers and posters and calls for donations to support this campaign (which you can send to us by checks at the order of "Maloka" or directly to ABC-Madrid at : ABC/CNA, Paseo Alberto Palacios 2, 28021 Villaverde Alto-Madrid, Spain where you can ask for further infos or by email at : edulibre@yahoo.es). Letters to Eduardo must be sent via ABC-Madrid as he’s censorsed his mail by prison authorities. That will be one more reason to flood spanish officials with protest messages !!!
-Ministro del Interior : estafeta@mir.es
-Ministro de Justicia : webmaster@mju.es
-Director Gral. de Instituciones Penitenciarias : mar.hedo@dgip.mir.es
-Conselo General del Poder Justicial : webmaster@cgpj.es
-Defensor del Pueblo : registro@defensordelpueblo.es
-Gabinete Tecnico de Ministerio de Interior : +34-913-354-050
-Direccio General de Serveis Penitenciaris i Rehabilitacio (DGSPIR) : +34-932-140-156
   « They want to frigthen us. They have tortured our friends in prison and have now jailed one of us. They have insulted our ideas and attacked our demostrations. We NEED your solidarity. We MUST free Eduardo García ». Edu’s support committee.

	In Bacelona, 8 people were arrested in their home for basically occupying the building illegally whereas they had an agreement with the owner. But this operation was actually a pretext to find any kind of "evidence" which could bring about the prosecution of the inhabitants, what became reality when the police found 2 issues of the bask magazine Ardibeltza. That seemed to be suffisciently convincing for the newspaper La Razon to start a criminalization campaign against them, pretending they were sympathizers of the ETA as they had hung a banner on the front wall that was calling for the grouping of bask political prisoners in Bask country. Squatters denied this accusation through a communique that aroused even more smear propaganda against them :"Our political practice focuses on the construction of an autonomous, anti-authoritarian and anti-capitalist zone open to all, on the experimentation of an alternative way of life in relation with the community and the city where we live. This criticism takes into account the fundamental rights related to prisoners' situation (of all kinds : shoplifters, rapists, drug traffickers, cops, basks or ettaras), as well as a wide quantity of other problems such as the process of economic globilization, the situation of immigrants, civic and social rights...we propose to offer a space for meetings and activities for various groups involved in social, musical, artistic and research issues in a non-sectarian scope which includes the support to public violence". Squatters from Barcelona have been harassed for many years for their suspection to support the ETA and the fact that "ettaras" was mentioned into this communique gave a good reason for authorities to activate their repressive forces. The arrested people were actually not allowed to see nor to communicate with their lawyer.
*
SOLIDARITY WITH THOMAS MEYER-FALK ! LET'S KEEP UP THE PRESSURE !
   Since the international action-day that took place last November 10th, it seemd like more of Thomas' supporters have managed to restablish contact with our comrade though permissions are still depending on the "good will" of thedeputy warden who keeps on confiscating some letters and materials which are "too political", "misappreciated" or which raise information about Thomas' situation. Indeed, the penitentiary administration tries hard to prevent his correspondances reporting his situation as they would have "a bad influence on his attitude if he could spread around his thoughts". Let's mention that Thomas did even not have the chance to inform his sympathizers of the trial he faced last September 2000 and that various interviews sent by left-wing magazines were censored as well. 
	As for now, it seems like Thomas' cell is still not correctly heated as he mentions writing from his bed because it's too cold writing on the table. The prison's chief warden asserted that nothing would change, i.e. that Thomas would remain in solitary confinement "because he's dangerous". Nice way to celebrate the new year...In response Thomas made a complaint to court to protest against the arbitrary treatment he's subjected to but he's still waiting for reply. 
	Thomas needs concrete support to put an end to the vicious circle is enrolled in and therefore we call any of those whose correspondance with Thomas suffers restrictions or censorship to keep protesting against german authorities. Fill up petitions, organize actions, or at least copy the model letter down here or send protest letters inspired from it to the following officials :
-Justizminister Professor Groll, Postfach 103 461, 70 029 Stuttgart, Germany. Fax : 0049-711-279-2264
-Justizvollzugsanstalt Bruchsal, Schonbornstr. 32, 76 646 Bruchsal, Germany. Fax : 0049-7251-788-299

To (name and contact of the official)						Date
	I'm writing you concerning a letter/material (mention if you are a publisher) which I sent to the inmate Thomas Meyer-Falk (JVA - Z.3117) currently held in segregation in Bruchsal prison. 
	Indeed, I was notified that my mail/material was confiscated by the deputy warden on (precise the date) on his own decision which I consider as a purely arbitrary punishment. The fact that Thomas was sentenced by a court and is now held in detention doesn't constitute a justification for him to be withdrawned his freedom of opinion. But one can only be free to have one's opinion if one is free to enjoy the freedom of press and to exchange opinions, what hasn't been allowed for Thomas whose principles and opinions you've been trying to break down. 
	Thomas Meyer-Falk is already held in segregation and the fact that he may have political exchanges or be sent political materials doesn't threaten at any level the inner security of the establishment where he's being detained. There's no justification for the censorship he's victim of. There's no justification for the arbitrary measures you're applying against Thomas and which I qualify as isolation within isolation.
	An international day of solidarity was coordinated last November 10th, among other intiatives of solidarity to protest against the victimization of our comrade Thomas and I guess our message was clearly forwarded to you by the various german representations concerned and targeted, in the case it wouldn't have been directly forwarded to yourself. However the confiscation of the letter/material I sent to Thomas makes me understand that you've remained careless towards our mobilization, which recalls therefore the necessity to persue our efforts until we witness your willingness to do something about Thomas' situation. Clearly, that correspond to : 
-end of censorship
-recovery of ALL his correspondances
-recognition of his freedom of opinion
-end of segregation for Thomas
(mention your own contact and name)								Yours faithfully, 
Further infos about Thomas Meyer-Falk by contacting ABC-Innsbrück : Postlagernd, 6024 Innsbruck, Austria or by email at abcibk@hushmail.com - You may have a look as well to their website : www.freespeech.org/entfesselt 
*
FRANCE : THEY DO NOT GUILLOTINE ANY LONGER, THEY WALL UP ALIVE
Repression in Lannemezan prison
	As we were telling you in the previous issue, a mobilization by prisoners has started in french prisons since Eric Minetto had launched an undefinite hunger strike. Eric has served more than 20 years* and according to the law, he should benefit of parole release since 20 years is the maximum surety time one can serve . However the french Justice has very big troubles with applying the law when it is about releasing some inmates and in the course of Eric's hunger strike, numerous prisoners have shown solidarity with his claims in several prisons such as Arles, La Sante, Fleury-Merogis, Villepinte, Toul or else Lannemezan to pressure the minister Lebranchu who has the power and the duty to release the releasable. Solidarity was mainly expressed through casual tray meal strikes and was followed by 45 inmates in Lannemezan while fewer prisoners did so in other detention centers.
	In the meantime, Eric stopped his strike last November 5th after having spent nearly 2 weeks at the Fresnes penitentiary hospital but the main vindications for which prisoners have mobilized have pulled the movement further (see their latest declaration down further). Similarly to the prisoners on struggle against FIES isolation units in Spain, prisoners require :
  -the abolition of segregation units
  -the immediate release of those suffering from incurable diseases and therefore whose condition remains incompatible with detention
  -freedom of all the inmates having served 20 years
	However, this mobilization has been hit by repression, particularly in Lannemezan prison where Eric Minetto was returned after his exit from the penitentiary hospital. Indeed, during the week from the 13th to the 18th of November, the penitentiary administration has sent riot police units twice to the detention center. Cops were armed with Famas rifle guns and sticks to end the agitation going on among prisoners. 6 inmates who were pointed as "main ringleaders for prisoners unrest" and accused of "bad influence over their fellows" have been particularly targeted. They had shown solidarity with Bask prisoners for their grouping and repatriation and with long-sentence inmates by making tray meal strikes and taking other kinds of pacific initiatives since the beginning of November.
	A couple of days after the police intervention one of them was transfered to isolation units in Fresnes detention center while the 5 others, whose identitiezs have been kept secret by the penitentiary administration, were transfered to other unknown prisons, probably in isolation units as well. The first one is a militant of the french guerilla organization Action Directe, Jean-Marc Rouillan, who's been detained for 14 years. His brutal transfer to the Fresnes isolation units and the fact that he's the only one whose name is known indicates the administation's willingness to make him pay his solidarity and involvement for prisoners as well as to make an example for the destiny of militant prisoners. He was actually part of the struggle initiated by Eric Minetto against long sentences, against the administration's refusal to grant parole release for the releasable, for the improvement of the detention suffered by the AD prisoners and had participated in other solidarity movements with other fellows (social and political) from Lannemezan for several months. To conclude this fierceness which has targeted Jean-Marc, the 2 last chapters of the book he was writing about the penitentiary system and his own detention as well as his computer were confiscated. It seems like the penitentiary administration is determinded to harshly repress those wo've realized that the struggle from behind the bars is possible.

Solidarity and struggle of the Action Directe prisoner collective
	In reaction to this long-term victimization of their fellow Jean-Marc, the 2 female members of Action Directe Nathalie Menigon and Joelle Aubron have launched a tray meal strike, respectively on November 4th and December 11th (they actually relieved each other since both their condition is still greatly affected by numerous hunger strikes and years spent in isolation). From November 27th to December 3rd, Edurne Sanchez del Arco, a Bask militant detained in the same prison as them had taken a similar initiative in solidarity with his comrade held in isolation in Fresnes. They wanna denounce the treatment applied to Jean-Marc and express their solidarity with the 5 other inmates who were transfered from Lannemezan prison to an unknown destination. As well, they emphasize on their full solidarity with prisoners' mobilization that has extended to various french prisons for the reasons mentioned above, with Bask, Breton and Corsican inmates who've run different kinds of hunger strikes since November 1999 and for which their fellow Jean-Marc had participated in a tray meal strike as well. In a communique, Joelle Aubron declares : « From one collective of militants to another, their claims match up. The policies of scattering of certain prisoners from their fellows, the use of torture by full segregation to smash down this or that one are all the reflection of one single logic sealed into the heart of repression : the criminalization or the neglection of the political nature of conflicts! Against this logic, we require :
-the closure of segregation units
-the political grouping 
-the end of the policy of scattering and the repatriation of Bask, Breton and Corsiscan prisoner collectives in their original country
-the release of prisoners whose condition remains incompatible with detention ».
	Furthermore, J-M Rouillan himself was on hunger strike from December 14th to January 31st to protest against his transfer and return in segregation, as well as the confiscation of his computer. It lasted then 49 days along which Jean-Marc lost 19kg, which is extremely long for prisoners such as AD who’ve been running this type of struggle for many years already. He was and still is greatly weakened by this loss of weight and all kinds of after-effects that result from an huger-strike. Joelle Aubron had joined the strike on January 8th in solidarity and substantially weakened as well as she lost 7 kg in 3 weeks. In the meantime, a demonstration was organized in Toulouse by Jean-Marc’s closed friends while prisoners from Lannemezan refused their tray meal from January 22nd to 29th to emphasize AD’s claims : the release of their fellow Georges Cipriani, appropriated medical care for Nathalie Menigon (who’s suffering from cardio-vascular problems and paralysis) and the transfer of J-M in a south-western prison closed to his family. They were numerous to recall the emergency of the situation concerning the situation and condition of the whole of AD prisoner collective and while putting an end to his hunger strike, Jean-Marc Rouillan obtained eventually the guarantee of his transfer to Arles prison as well as medical care for Georges Cipriani and Nathalie Menigon.
	This continuation of AD prisoners’ struggle is the expression of their refusal to swallow passively the scientificly elaborated programs of annihilation to break them down physically and psychologically, to suffer silently their own destruction by white torture. It’s actually in the scope of making a clear stand of solidarity against modern methods of execution, the « slow and safe death »* which western so-called democratic states export as vanguards of their willingness to wipe out resistance, that AD prisoners did take action together with turkish revolutionary prisoners as well as some signatories of the Platform of June 19th. Their victimization can not last any longer, white torture can not last any longer.
	To close this parenthesis about the AD prisoners, we recall the situation of Georges Cipriani who still remains held in detention in spite of his condition which was testified as incompatible with it by psychiatrists and recognized as such by the penitentiary administration itself. The collective « Ne Laissons Pas Faire », supported by the international solidarity, has required many times his release by meeting directly the direction of the Chancellerie and presenting numerous petitions signed by many personalities. Nevertheless, the establishment of visiting rooms has never been applied and the collective's requests regarding Georges' detention has remained totally ignored by the penitentiary administration which confines to keep polite with the media through traditional promises, the habit maintained by a State whose class society is on crisis !!! Let's mention that the Chancellerie has engaged itself to improve the AD prisoners' conditions of detention since 1989....
For further infos, contact : Ne Laissons Pas Faire, c/o LPJ, 58 rue Gay-Lussac, 75005 Paris, France.

*Note : According to Eric Minetto himself, his 20 year sentence was the consequence of his involvements in the autonomous movement. However the collective Ne Laissons Pas Faire declares it had the opportunity to consult the period features related to his case and asserts that the reasons exposed by Eric are not the true ones. According to these features, Eric was convicted to 20 years together with a fellow of his for the rape and murder of his girlfriend. This controversy may lead some militants to become sceptical not only about the sympathy they may have for him, but about the entire sympathy and support they might bring to the prisoner mobilization. 
We had started to take initiatives to support Eric Minetto's hunger strike at the very beginning by spreading petitions but considering this clarification regarding the reasons which led Eric to be jailed, we need to precise our position.
	As anarchists, we consider rape as an anti-humane act which affects terribly one's dignity and as a great offence to individual freedom. Therefore it is clear to us that we cannot and are not willing to support any inmate who got jailed for such reason. As well we would refuse to grant financial or other support to an inmate who would request it from us and would be convicted for rape. Regarding Eric Minetto's case, we do not find very 'polite' from him to use the autonomous movement as a way to get attention even if we think he did so in order to have the best chance to be supported and eventually to put an end to the past 20 years he's spent in detention. We also take into account that it is impossible to know what might go through one's mind after being imprisoned over 20 years. This also why we do not blame Eric Minetto even if we feel somehow betrayed by him. 
	However it is clear to us that Eric' strike has performed a substantial role in the late development of resistance in french prisons against long sentences and the non application of parole release. It gave the opportunity to many other prisoners which are not necessarily political to get on touch with other inmates and participate in a movement which concern them directly, for a purpose which concern them all. That cannot be denied and it would be ridiculous to close our eyes on a prisoner movement because it was initiated by a rapist. Consequently, we do not regret the support we brought to Eric, considering first that we actually never focused on his case specifically and that we did take initiatives towards Eric in the scope of supporting the claims which raised from his hunger strike (to which numerous others identified to join eventually this prisoner movement). We recall that these claims are the concern of ALL prisoners and that's why they gather political as social ones. But without breaking the walls of silence, without coordination and solidarity here outside, in the streets, sovereigns will remain free to break down prisoner movements and persue as well the frame up of their supporters outside as it is currently the case of our spanish comrade Edoardo Garcia Macias.

CENSORSHIP : Last, it is important to mention that the french edition of the ABC-Dijon newsbulletin was forbidden for delivery in Lannemezan prison because of the 'troubles' which have affected it latestly. Furthermore, our publication is targeted by new reprisals. After being seized or returned casually but numerous times for unclear reaons in the case of bretn prisoners, after the censorship by prison authorities in Lannemezan prison, an increasing number of our fellow hostages is being arbitrarily censored our french edition. Eventually it was seized in a letter to a comrade of us in Arles prison because this « publication doesn’t specifically nor exclusively concern the addressee ». Obviously, this explaination is not worth in regard of the law which requires that such measure must be affected by an official decision of the ministry of justice (according to the articles D. 414 and D. 415 of the penal procedure code). 
Meanwhile, a certain number of prisoners are forbidden to receive mail or publications from ABC, which greatly marginalizes them from the struggle run by other prisoners and outside and which might be closely linked to the struggle they may run 
from their own cell. This is actually a big problem in the current time considering the need to keep them informed of the development of prisoners’ mobilization as it is the case in various prisons against long sentences. It is even more a problem as the justice department is now elaborating the new penitentiary legacy that will most probably allow it to increase the maximum detention time to 30 years ! We call then all those who think there’s an interest in assuring the delivery of our french edition to show solidarity against this arbitrary censorship. Solitary confinement is already too much, up to us to prevent more isolation which undoubtedly means more repression. Please make petitions or send protest letters to the french minister of Justice at : Mme Lebranchu, ministre de la Justice, 13 Place Vendôme, 75 001 Paris, France.

	Here down is a new communique of the prisoners from Lannemezan who continue the struggle. This shows furthermore that they are absolutely able to organize themselves in spite of the transfer of their « ringleaders ».

Communique of the prisoners from Lannemezan prison 
	It is now one year that Mme Vasseur, famous doctor at La Sante prison, has released her book that was going to upset the French Penitentiary Landscape and bring MP's to become indignant and spread around their humanism under media's spotlights.
	A mess of loud screams came over and invaded medias. Some held on this opportunity to campaign; opportunism, humanism, no matter as long as it rhymes...Each of them had their own speech.
	Were we on the right way ?
	Along the following months there were many rallies crossing the countryside and discovering (or pretending to discover) what a prison was, swearing that we would see about all that...Indeed one couldn't tolerate such practices any longer and such conditions of existence imposed on human beings had to stop. 
	A year later, what's left from your speeches ? Nothing has changed. You, MP's and senators together, politicians from all wings, you returned to the golden rooms of the Republic which we do not want to be ours. You've left us dying on the same slow and safe way until now, in the same prisons which horrified you however not so long ago.
	By the way, could you precise what you'd have liked to see changing ?
	The annihilation methods that strike us ?
	The state of decay of the coaches that bring us towards this slow and safe death for which you destined us ?
	One dies there still on the same slow and safe way, subjected to the diktat of warders who full of hatred, feel nostalgic from the time they didn't have to call us Sir to order us to bend down and spread our legs so they could appreciate the state of an anus which no one knows what it could harbour. Such is the price to pay to tear off a short time to spend with those one loves.
	One dies there still on the same slow and safe way, victim of the sad plot set up by the white dressed staff who considers that the condition of those of us suffering from all possible sicknesses (AIDS, cancers, etc) is satisfying...until the time where they will be sent to civil hospital so as they don't die in detention.
	One dies there still on the same slow and safe way, hopeless in your security prisons from which no one gets out any more but on the end of one's time. Those prisons which your political willingness has turn into extermination camps where death hangs around always slower, always more present, always more effiscient.
	One dies there still on the same slow and safe way in isolation units, suffering the white torture sessions you've established in order to break down those of us who refused to collaborate, those who do not wanna die. White torture which you perfected until refinement by resorting to psychiatry to take away the credibility of those who still wanna fight, a mad man's always a good laugh...
	One dies there always on the same slow and safe way faced with the indifference of the high magistrates from the Chancellerie, attracted by their carrier plans and at the disposal of their hierarchy's electoral requirements. All those magistrates carry hundreds of casualties on their conscience, if one can still suppose they have ever had one. Death of sick prisoners who were dropped without appropriate medical care, death of prisoners who arrived at the bottom of despair and tired of hoping, prefered chosing themselves the time for the sad end to which you destined them.
	One dies there always on the same slow and safe way faced with the pain of one's closed friends, of one's family who you doom to more sacrifices by sending us always further away from them. Some of them must travel for 50 hours to get a short time of privacy that becomes always more rare.
	That's enough !! Today, we do not ask for our freedom any longer, we require it.
	Your leaps and your talks are uneffiscient. They do not make anybody dream any more. They annoy us, they disturb us. 
	We will not let you turn over prisons where you hold us deported into Huntsville where time will do the dirty job instead of you. They will not become the castles' dugeon which your ancestrals crushed down at the time of bourgeois revolutions. We will not be the serfs of your Lords and their revenge any longer.
	One dies there and you keep on building new prisons.
	Thanx, your fierceness opened the doors of resistance to us, we refuse to die, and we bear so your security and bourgeois management.
	Release of all the sick prisoners and those prepared to benefit from conditional release. Immediate closure of segregation units.
											Lannemezan prisoner collective  
 
(To the minister of Justice)
			Minister,
   As for the beginning of the year 2001, we hesitate between offering you our best wishes and forwarding you our requirements. We chose eventually for the second option.
	Long sentences, the category we belong to, has been added 12 months more to the very long years we spent inside your walls. 
	12 months to receive our families into those gloomy and sordid zones you dare calling visiting rooms.
	12 months more of misery for those of us who are sick and who cannot get the indispensable medical care they need for their condition, which is upon your political kindness. This medical care would allow them to be registered amongst the living.
	12 months of deluded hopes which have to be deprived of the perspective of conditional release once again, in spite of our families’ willful expectations as well as our own.
	12 months which strengthen our certainty of remaining walled up alive, doomed to always pay for the price of your personal and political ambitions.
	12 months watching the disgusting show of the obvious injustice which subjects the well-to-do and pushes us into your dungeons.
	12 months which doom us to consider that the only alternative you offer us remains the struggle without concession in response to your desire of annihilation versus our legitimate claims.
 	We require the immediate release of all prisoners having served their surety time.
	We require the immediate release of all sick prisoners and those whose life is ending.
	We require the immediate closure of segregation units.
											Lannemezan prisoner collective

Repression in Arles prison
	« A pistol, a mobile phone and other little tools one wouldn’t expect to find in a maximum security prison were discovered in Arles prison. Prisoners expected the worst until the ministry orders a search in the establishment. About a hundred of warders had been requisitioned from various other prisons in addition of dozens of riot police armed with sticks and shields. Cells were then searched one by one. When prisoners returned to their cells, a hurrican had passed by. Some of them started to shout, to insult and kick the door that had just shut after them. Some non-conformed shelves made out of cardboard were teared off, posters and photos from families were torn, diverse personal objects had disappeared. The next day, fights started for nothing ; a badly considered expression, a doubtfull look and strokes were going on right away. Numerous inmates were demanding their property missing or asking for reparation of the damages. This kind of search is felt as real rape for any common prisoner. Now they’ve calmed down « as it is the time where christmas presents come through visiting rooms. Nothing better than a full stomach to recover from hard times, it is well-known ! » (extract from a letter sent by a fellow from Arles).
*
RAISING TENSIONS AROUND MUMIA'S CASE
Holland : the conspiracy against the Mumia demonstrators fails
   As we were telling you in the first issue, some of the demonstrators who had attended the protest held at the US embassy last September 2nd were facing a trial on December 1st. Amongst the 6 people initially under charges, only 4 of them were finally going before the court since accusations were too weak for the other 2 and finally dropped.
	The entire prosecution of the 4 defendants was actually based on a video tape which allegedly shew evidence for their "guilt". The defense had made numerous demands to watch this video at least once but without any result though legally, the defense and the prosecution must have common materials. A description of it made by the police was all that the defendants could confine with, and according to them, this description only consisted of lies directly coming down from officers' imagination. 
	Yet, the video tape constituted as well the only evidence for the defendants to prove their own innocence, besides some doctors' certificates and a collective complaint against the police they were holding to emphasize their statements. They were hoping that the video would be shown at least on the day of the court but 3 days before it takes place, cops pretended to have lost it !! Weird "coincidence" if that video was actually proving how criminal the defendants may had been during the protest and how rightful the police intervention was. 
	Anyway the main material evidence was gone and in such a situation, what may have been considered as evidence by itself remained cops' statements against the defendants. We have to believe that the Den Haag police, who was substantially present at the court, expected a judge who would confine to take its statements as evidence for this trial so as to sentence the 4 protestors. Unfortunately for henchmen (and luckily for the defendants) the judge didn't and ordered instead an investigation to find out what has happened to the video tape.Mumia demonstrators The audience is then suspended till the court obtains clarifications about this "mysterious disappearance". That will probably take a long time since the Den Haag police is now in a very delicate situation, all the more since it must bear the pressure of the US diplomacy and the dutch government to find a way out, but above all, a way to preserve their image and credibility.
	Some parts of the declaration prepared by the defendants for their trial and that was delivered to the press during the gathering that preceeded the audience
and along press conferences are published here below : 
   « (…) As of late, the worldwide campaign has been awaiting for a final decision regarding a new trialfor Mumia and the overturning of his current conviction. However this solidarity movement in the US has called attention to the US justice system’s intention of legally murdering Jamal, and has thus been hit by a fierce repression for the last several years until now (see « Clark Kissinger jailed »). 
	Furthermore, Mumia’s case has been denounced all over the world, further compromising the US justice’s plans which clearly remain to execute Mumia. Therefore the influence of the US over countries maintaining relations or having engagements towards them has had as a consequence the extension of the repression outside the US. The police intervention at the demo we held on Septemer 2nd as well as the conspiracy set up against us are a clear expression of the collaboration between the wave of repression unleashed in the US and certainppower structures to repress our campaign (…).
	An escalation of the situation could have been expected as a result of that intentional strategy to first attck the demo, disperse people as quickly as possible and finally use that confusion as an opprtunity to arrest some of the demonstrators. Additionally it could have been expected that demonstrators themselves, having been assaulted and suddenly confrontated with unjustified arrests and police violence, would attempt to intervene in defense of those under attack. In the midst of such confusion, we can hardly be held responsible for reacting and assisting our comrades as they faced the wrath of the police attack. (…).
	We declare that we have nothing to hide and we stand for what we did since our actions at the spur of the moment followed the conspiracy designed to criminalize and victimize us from the beginning. Basically for these reasons alone, we think thatnot us but the police and the embassy should be prosecuted. But we have additional arguments on which we call for their prosecution (…).
	Now let’s mention that the prosecution’s main evidence (a video tape) now appears to have gotten « lost ! » under mysterious circumstances. This declaration was issued by the police themselves 3 days before the trial takes place following repeatedattempts by the defense to view this « incriminating evidence » (…). This new intentional mistake of the police, as the crowning of the entire conspiracy against us, clearly indicates that the police actually do have something to hide, while at the same time depriving us of having a fair trial (…)  
	But such an elaborated conspiracy would not have occured but for the intention of coverng up the level of police misconduct we observed on September 2nd. Our action emerged at a time when the US government and its diplomatic arm are engaged in an attempt to remove the internatinal spotlight on Mumia’s case by dragging out the procedure in order to achieve their final goal : the execution of Mumia. As we pointed out, international relations withthe Usare at stake. Therefore one couldexpect that theUS would actually require from their allies to participate in the repression of the Mumia campaign. This repression remains absolutely politically orientated but officially, political freedom and freedom of speech are established policy. What’s more,no one can officially be a political prisoner and Mumia is actually the symbol of this denial. But the credibility of such values requires the criminalization of political militants, and in Mumia’s case in particular, the credibility of the US democracy depends on the criminalization of his sympathizers. Indeed it wouldn’t be verydemocratic to charge us for « solidarity with an alleged political prisoner » a political crime ! (…) The struggle continues !
ABOLISH DEATH PENALTY ! FREE MUMIA ABU-JAMAL ! FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS ! » The Mumia 4.
 
	Futhermore, a member of the Eugene activist community, Amos Hildebrand, was sentenced to 2 months in county jail and 3 years on probation for his involvement in the April 24th Mumia protest in downtown Eugene. On October 27th, Amos was convicted of unlawful use of weapon, misbehaviour and resisting arrest. Amos was actually shot with a less-lethal weapon, tackled and arrested by riot police for allegedly  kicking aside a burning can towards fully armored police. The can rolled up to one of the officers and hit his foot. He was then put on trial for attempted assault with a weapon and the charges mentioned above. Amo's first trial resulted in a hang jury. During the second hearing, he was acquitted on the assault charge but was indicted on the unlawful use of weapon charge by a split jury (2 of the initial 10 members).
	The district attorney proposed a 3 year prison sentence largely because of the political nature of the trial. The Eugene police were also in court to petition the judge for the maximum possible sentence to quell future protests. However the judge satisfied himself with ridiculing Amos and protests in general so opted for a lenient sentence. The judge declared that since it was a political case, he felt pressured to side with police and prosecution. However he chose to impose a 'more rational sentence' though Amos emphasizes on his innocence, i.e. a sentence that would prevent an escalation from both political sides so as avoid further allocations ? Meanwhile, Amos was released earlier than expected and we’re glad for him.
From The Haag to Eugene, let's prosecute the police!!!

Some persecutions we would not complain about…
   The dutch Mumia Campaign also mobilized to welcome the new (non-elected) american president, George W. Bush, Governor of Texas, the «killing state». His ascendancy to the throne of the most powerful imperialist empire in human history, was marked by a sharp clash of forces in Washington. Having become associated with some of the most reactionary elements in the U.S., and becoming president on the basis of an election that is widely viewed as having been stolen, "Mr. Death" was immediately challenged by giant demonstrations protesting both who he is and what he is doing!
   Predictably, the Washington police had already been mobilized to intimidate protestors in a massive show of force. They had already announced that the parade route (on public streets!) would only be accessible to Bush supporters, not demonstrators !
   The Mumia Steungroep - Rotterdam called for a presence at the American embassy in Den Haag on January 20th, day of Bush’s presidency, to show international disgust at the incoming American regime, and solidarity with the protestors in Washington. Supporters of  Mumia Abu-Jamal (among others) stood outside the embassy and passed out fliers to people in the area. 
For further infos, go to the webpage of the dutch Mumia campaign : www.xs4all.nl/-tank or contact ABC-Dijon (english edition). You may have a look at www.cosimapp-mumia.org/photo1.htm to get reports of the demos that took place in Washington last January 20th.

Solidarity actions with Mumia
	In marge of this trial, the French American institute from Rennes (Brittany) was occupied for about 2 hours in solidarity with Mumia Abu-Jamal and the victims of the 'american goulag' (the prison industrial complexe) on the initiative of the Anarchist Federation, the CNT (anarcho-syndicalist union), the SCALP (network against the leading fascist Le Pen), the collective DU RU TY and various other individuals. The american, french, european and polish flags were taken down and replaced by the black flag of anarchy. Protest messages were sent by fax to the White house as well as a message of solidarity with Mumia. An action was led against a texan restaurant (in prediction of G. Bush Jr’s election) and the Alexis Carrel Avenue was renamed Mumia Abu-Jamal street. A similar action was planned by the NO PASARAN network and the collective Breizh Etrevroadel in Thiers and Morlaix. Unfortunately we were not communicated the exact date of this mobilization but we situate it around the very end of November 2000 according to the date of delivery mentioned in the message (further infos by contacting space@xoom.fr).
   Furthermore, a national demonstration for the release of Mumia and Leonard Peltier, against Bush’s presidency and death penalty is being planned for May 12th, 2000 in Paris as it is a world action-day in support of Mumia. Let’s remind that the judge in charge of the case can announce a trial or else, decide not to allow any new appeal at any moment ! Therefore, the cosimapp that runs the french Mumia campaign calls for being prepared right now to react in extreme urgency. More infos in the next bulletin and in the meantime, contact : cosimapp@cosimapp-mumia.org if you wanna get involved for this world action-day.
Clark Kissinger jailed!!!
	Based on his participation in a 1999 sit-down at the misnamed 'Liberty Bell' in Philadelphia, Kissinger, along with 96 other protestors, was cited for "failing to oey a lawul order" though it is questionable wether such order was ever given. Yet, most of those arrested received a minor fine for this inconsequential violation but Clark and a few other who contested the charge were treated to an unsual sentence : supervised probation. The condition of that 'probation' were a complete affront to any notion of civil liberties : he had to report his income and financial transactions, he was forbidden to meet with Mumia and confiscated his passport so as he wouldn't be allowed to travel out of his federal court district without 'permission'.
	Kissinger properly saw that the travel restriction was a ploy to deprive him of his right of free speech since he was systematicly denied travel permissions for requests involving political activity whereas personal travel requests were allowed. He took the step of defying those restrictions on his basic rights and travelled to Philadelphia on August 1st, 2000, accepting an invitation to deliver a speech in support and defense of Mumia. That simple (rightful) act of defiance was the pretext for calling him to court on December 6th. 
	Result og the trial : Clark Kissinger was found guilty of violating his probation and sentenced to 3 months in jail plus a re-instatement of his probation conditions after release!! He was taken away in hand-cuffs as well as 2 youth who were in the court room when it was aggressively cleared. Not having succeeded in putting Mumia to death in 1995 and again in 1999 as it had planned to, the repressive state is instead turning its attention to his supporters, targeting the most active and trouble-making members of the international campaign. In this way they expect to cripple the movement in defense of Mumia and prevent a large show of support as Mumia goes soon into federal court to appeal the frame-up he's been victim of for 20 years now. However the extent to which the US diplomacy has manipulated the legal system in order to put Clark Kissinger out of action, to which they are pressuring foreign authorities to repress international solidarity and to prosecute on minor charges its militants shows its desperation. Let's persue our efforts!!!
Call or send faxes to Judge Arnold C. Rapoport to demand the immediate release of Clark Kissinger. 
-Honorable Arnold C. Rapoport, 504 Hamilton St., Room 3401, Allentown, PA. Phone (001)610-776-0369. Fax (001) 610-776-0379
*
BRIEF NEWS ITEMS
France, FTP trial : in the last bulletin, we announced the trial against the FTP (Francs Tireurs Partisans) who’ve been prosecuted for their numerous direct actions against locals of the french fascist ex-party National Front. Their trial was actually postponed again because of lawyer’s strike and took place eventually last February 6th and 7th in Marseille (South of France). Numerous sympathizers shew up and everybody could even not get in the court room. This trial was particularly interesting for the attention it attracted from very diverse parts of society as the presence of a real FTP member from WW2 among the defense witnesses demonstrates it. Indeed, a big political work was done by many antifascist and anarchist groups in France along the past few months to catch wide public attention on the prosecution of the convicts and the issue raised by their struggle. It shew that unity remains a real force which was eventually very appreciated as Yves Peirat, the only convict who’s remained imprisoned, got 5 years jail, which was more or less an expected sentence but for which one can be « glad » considering it could have been much heavier. The accusations of « organized gang » and « terrorism » were actually dismantled by the defense and Peirat expressed the conviction of his present and past engagements for the anti-fascist struggle (for those who couldn’t stand reading the list until the end, he’s actually also a signatory of the Platform of June 19th). 
 A demo attended by 500 had taken place on the 3rd to show solidarity with the 2 anti-fascists and the struggle they run as well as to attract attention a couple of days before the trial. This demo was basically an expression of political support to recall the fact that the fascist threat is still a topical and burning issue, which is absolutely fundamental for the support of an imprisoned activist who intends to bear his/her conviction as an expectable consequence of his/her acts. The mobilization of the last months as well as their name (FTP), which was also the name of a french communist guerilla fighting against nazi occupation during the 2nd world war and that caught basic interest, hopefully recalled to many « ordinary people » that even though we are not under nazi occupation any longer, even though the extreme right-wing party National Front doesn’t exist any more, they need to watch out. Get the latest infos at : www.samizdat.net/solidarite/html/kit.htm 
Prague demo : On February 1st, Mads Thordal Traerup the 18 year old Dane was freed of all charges in the prague city court. The prosecutor recommended 2 years in jail or 500 000 kc as a fine as well as a ban from Czech Republic for ever.
The 3 judges didn’t agree and cleared him of all charges. 3 policemen testified. Their testimonies varied and they couldn’t identify him positively. The prosecutor will think about appealing the case. Another Dane didn’t come to his courtcase which was to be held together with Mads'. The prosecutor wanted the cases to be treated as one. But they eventually decided to go ahead with Mads' case anyway. Over the next more court cases in Prague will take place. Follow up at the following email address: praguelegalsupport@purpleturtle.com or go to www.no-racism.net/s26 
Eugene (USA) : The trial of activists Jeffrey « Free » Luers and Craig « Critter » Marshall was supposed to take place on October 3rd as we anounced in the lastissue but this trial was eventually postponed. They had actually been incarcerated since June 16th, 2000 and had plead « not guilty » to nine felony charges, including arson and misdemeanor. On November 20th, the Free and Critter Legal Defense Committee was issued a terrible news : Free’s defense attorney, Ken Morrows, suffered a fatal heartattack ! This confusion following this unprecedented turn of events has led to motions of severance, mistrial and new plea bargains from the deputy district attorney prosecuting the case, Caren Tracy, and the DA’s office.
Free was offered 156 months in prison and years of probation. In the deal Free would have to plead guilty to « arson 1 » and « conspiracy to commit arson ».  Free decided against the offer and because of publicity of the trial due to his lawyer’s death, decided that a mistrial would be in his best interest.  
After considering advice from his lawyer and friends as well astalking with Free, Critter decided to accept the deal offered to him. He didn’t agree to admit the guilt but acknowleged that it was possible for the prosecutor to convict on the evidence. Critter was sentenced on November 22nd, 2000 to 66 months in prison with 3 years probation for « conspiracy to commit arson » and 6 months and 2 years probation for « possession of a destructive device ». They are to run conccurently. It also appears that Critter will be eligible for « boot camp » after 11 months. After completing these 6 months boot camp, Critter would be eligible for early release. Let’s remind that both men were initially risking a 86 year prison sentence. Besides, his attorney noted that Measure 11 forces people to make decisions they do not want to make ! Hard decision to take indeed, but what would one do in such situation remains the question…Follow up 
at : O.U.R Credit Union c/o Free and Critter Legal Defense, PO Box 11 922, Eugene, OR 97 440 or by email to eae@efn.org (please send donations there as well as funds need to be raised to pay lawyers).
Davos demo : The summit of the 1000 « global leaders », the 1000 worst executioners of the planet, was taking place on the end of January 2001 as usual in the ski station of Davos in Switzerland. This year, swiss authorities were sharply prepared to prevent any trouble, which actually resulted in the militarization of the entire territory as they had to defend the summit area itself so as to prevent demonstrators to disturb their money talks, strengthen border control to reject directly a wide number of protestors who were coming from various european countries as well as managing a mass of insurrectionaries scattered accross the country to carry actions locally. Pretty many foreigners eventually managed to pass borders thanx to swiss activists who were organized to pass them through with swiss-registered cars as well as exercizing a real pressure at different borders as it was the case in the Tessain province nearby Italy. 
Billionaires and their fellow economists eventually managed to have their talks about how to share and increase the profits of the world exploitation under the protection of militaries and barbed wire, though little groups of protestors managed to reach the fortress in Davos step by step. On January 27th, most of them were actually blocked down the valley by police forces, about 2000 people according to certain underground sources, so decided finally to fold over Zürich where they were forbidden to enter the town center by shots of plastic bullets (it was hot for the business center and its numerous bank agencies...). About 1000 people clashed with riot police along the night and targeted symbolical representations of globilized economy. 121 people were arrested along these few days of global resistance and 35 were still in custody on the day following riots. As for now, all attendents seem to be released as no call for solidarity has been formulated. Possible further infos in the next bulletin or in the meantime, go to www.chez.com/maloka for a more complete outcome.
Correction : In the last issue, we edited an article in « Brief news items » about elections in Gent, Belgium, mentioning that the Vlaams Block (belgian extreme right-wing party) had made headway in several belgian cities. We here declare this information to be wrong. Even though we try to check information source everytime, we had actually not checked that information ourselves. So let’s make clear that the Vlaams Block doesn’t have so much extension in Belgium as we were pretending to in our article. Our very apologize if that brought some of you to misleading. Let’s keep an eye anyway… 
Eurotop in Nice : Nice had turned over into a thick cloud of tear gas last December 6th and 7th while european representatives were trying to discuss the Charter for Fundamental rights, the privatization of health or else the militarization of their european business community in spite of the clashes that were occuring just outside the Congress building. They had been warned however in Baiona already that their plans for mass management would open the doors to a hard confrontation between demonstrators and authorities but the requirements of capital pushed them into preparing the ground for class war.
The protest consisted in 2 main political tendences which split up in 2 demonstrations : the first one on December 6th was attended by about 150 000 unionist people, police unions in front, for a lawful exhibition. The second one was on the 7th and gathered people who intended to enter the well-protected congress building and interrupt discussions which more and more obviously deal exclusively with the ruling class’ interests. As french Prime Minister Jospin notified it, protestors didn’t manage to defeat the security device but clashes obliged riot police to shoot tear gas so much as the air-conditioned system of the congress building absorbed a wide quantity of it, which deeply annoyed politicians who had to sneeze along their talks. As a result of these confrontations, numerous bank and insurance agencies, car dealers and diverse corporate stores were seriously wrecked while police forces had to register a number of injured officers.
About 50 were arrested all along the summit and 17 have been prosecuted amongst 2 young Bask. One of them was unfortunately carrying a pocket knife, which constituted a suffiscient offence to send both of them before the court within 2 days (immediate penal court procedure). Media took care for pointing bask militants as the leaders of the clashes so as to define all attendents as sympathizers of the ETA. It seems like being Bask is by itself an offence when one demonstrates in France : Anna and Jose were charged with « violence during a gathering » and « carrying of an arm » and eventually sentenced to one month imprisonment. They are now released but 5 other demonstrators, members of the anarchist federation and the CNT, were sent before the court on February 1st for « hindrance to circulation ». One of them was cleared but all others were sentence to pay fines of 3000 to 5000 ff. Other trials are supposed to take place in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, the convicts called for financial support to pay their single lawyer as well as the fines they are required to pay. You can send donations directly to the account Chat Noir Turbulent (CNT), CCP 8897 05U Lyon or by check to : CNT, salle 15bis, Bourse du travail, 42 028 St Etienne cedex 1, France.
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BELGIUM : One year imprisonment for "crime of solidarity"!
Communique of the Committee against Expulsions
   Tuesday 30th, January 2001, at approximately 22h30, Mr Pascal Marchand, a member of the Collective against Expulsions, was taken from his house and imprisoned in Vorst (Brussels). This arrest is about the application of a sentence by default delivered by the 50th Chamber of Correctional Court in Brussels. Pascal Marchand was condemned on Friday 26th of January to one year imprisonment on the accusations of "assault and grievous bodily harm", "attempt to rob", and "destruction of property".
   The facts? A demonstration took place before the closure of the centre 127bis in Steenokkerzeel, on the 3rd of October 1999, to denounce the collective extradition of Roman gypsies. The incidents? Pascal Marchand does not admit the facts that are brought against him. So, one year in prison because he acted in solidarity with refugees who the police even figured out with striping their skin before deporting them. 
   Pascal Marchand does not recognise this judgement and considers himself as a political prisoner. Consequently, he refuses to submit himself to this type of authority and started a hungerstrike and a thirst strike as soon as he was incarcerated. In reaction, the penitentiary authorities of Vorst started a campaign to break him down. Since his arrival, Pascal Marchand has been kept in solitary confinement, in the «unit of reflexion», the hole, and has been beaten up regularly. He has numerous visible traces on his face and complains about pains he feels over his whole body. A doctor was supposed tovisit him on Friday the 2nd to make an assessment . The Forest prison is by the way known for its violent practices (as was reported in a belgian newspaper recently). 
   The criminalisation of the social movement? Awaiting for his trial on appeal (which was supposed to take place in the second week of February), Pascal Marchand has remained in prison. We warned prison the director and the minister of justice who’s directly responsable for the Pascal’s fate while we reserve for ourselves the right to implement the actions which turn out to be necessary.
   We are confronted here with a new case of criminalisation of social movement. Indeed, the Collective against Expulsions has been subjected to numerous attempts of intimidation by the judicial and police authorities and many of its members are still charged. This case proves again that we live in a state where repression wins over democracy.
   We support our fellow in his hungerstrike and call again for civil disobedience, confronted with the violence exercised by the State and that affects all the detainees, be they common, political or without legal papers : they are victims of the same policies of "surveillance and punishment". 
   Last information !! : On Friday 9th, February, the Collective against Expulsions called for a pacific gathering attended by 400 people at the Court in Bruxelles to require the immediate release of Pascal Marchand. He was indeed going before the court to oppose the sentence.
The gathering was attended by ecologist MP’s, some members of the Belgian Jewish Progressist Union, some representatives of the Rom community, some students, etc and of course, police authorities.
   The audience was very short as right after verifying Pascal’s identity, she decided for his immediate release, though the final decision should come over on May 4th. A wide part of the demonstrators walked then to Forest prison to welcome their fellow who was ending his 11th day of strike.
   Solidarity performed a great role for this release. Apart from the numerous people present at the gathering, thousands of messages were sent to the ministry of Justice and officials at Forest prison who had to change of phone number. MP’s had actually visited Pascal while in detention and a doctor from outside the prison managed to visit him as well in spite of the obstacles set up by the penitentiary administration. He could then testify for the injuries suffered by Pascal, which didn’t please warders who fear complaints against them. But this release is only a partial victory considering the number of « illegal » people detained in specific establishments and exploited as an underclass by multinationals to be eventually deported. As Pascal stated, « the struggle against the police state is not finished » and the policies of immigration applied by european states are far from being the solution to put an end to this social movement.That actually still goes on as another militant against governmental policies of immigration, Leo Paepen, an active member of the Open Border association, is being prosecuted for « rebellion ». For further infos you can contact him at the following phone number : 016/77.02.69 or c/o Rueken, bosstraat 24, 3471 Hoeleden, Belgium or go to www.collectifs.net/ccle/
For further infos contact : Collectif Contre les Expulsions, Rue Van Elewijk 35, 1050 Bruxelles, Belgium. Tel: 02/644.17.11 fax: 02/648.51.18. E-mail : ccle@altern.org - http://www.collectifs.net/ccle
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BRITTANY : Update of the breton prisoners’ struggle
	The turning hunger strike launched by breton political prisoners since October 1st, 2000 to obtain their grouping and repatriation in Brittany, the right to speak breton during investigation and hearings and the immediate release of sick prisoners is continuing. Last January 1st, 2001 Christian Georgeault relieved his comrade Gérard Bernard and took over the hunger strike. In the meantime, Denez Riou was released on December 22nd, 2000.
	Gérard Bernard, Emgann militant in custody for nearly a year and a half now following the robbery of explosives in Plévin, was lately refused his request for release registered on the beginning of January. It appears that the 14th -anti-terrorist- section of the Paris Bench hasn’t investigated his and their cases any further but keeps on maintaining them in detention for « presumption of guilt », i.e. without any evidence but their willingness to keep political activists out of any action. Judges suppose, or wanna believe in breton prisoners’ participation at different levels in various operation for and of armed struggle, which is for them a suffiscient reason not to release them, no matter how unlawful it can be moreover as none of them has been tried yet nor appears to be tried in the coming months. However this time was too much for Gérard who moreover cannot take care financially for his child any longer so he decided to appeal this late denial. It was actually supposed to be investigated last February 2nd.
	However, far from being confined to breton prisoners only, repression strikes seriously breton militant organizations as well as prisoners’ families, amongst Christian Georgeault’s as he’s been on hunger strike since January 1st (we do not know if he’s still or not). Here follows a communique by the prisoner support collective Skoazell Vreizh from January 20th, 2000 :
	« When Miss Solenn Georgeault presented herself at 15.00pm at La Santé prison while arriving from Brittany to visit her friend Arno Vannier (in custody),
she was refused to enter the visiting room without being given any explaination. She had actually obtained a permit to visit him the previous week.
	Several times Skoazell Vreizh denounced the difficulties encountered by breton political prisoners’ families to visit their relatives (distance between inmates and families, lengthened visits pretty rare, etc). 
	Lately, Skoazell Vreizh was revolting against the differences of treatment to obtain a visit permit if one’s called Mittérand or Georgeault whereas both are in the same judicial situation.
	The way Solenn Georgeault and her friend are treated looks like psychological fierceness to keep on distabilizing this family. We recall Mrs Mireille Georgeault had also had to wait for 3 months before obtaining a permit and visit her husband.
	In France, democratic country, the social status of an individual influences the course of justice, what is unacceptable in a State of right ». 
									 	For Skoazell Vreizh, Secretary H. Herjean, January 20th, 2001

A Letter to the Members of the European Parliament
        « Madam, Sir,
We write to notify you the situation we live in today in Brittany, in the French State, a situation which appears to be without exit and which can only sadden and surprise upholders of democracy. You undoubtedly know that Brittany was formerly an independent State, annexed by France following wars and broken treaties in the 16th century. This annexation did not, however, put an end to the Breton language or culture. At the time of annexation, Brittany was an economically prosperous nation. Integrated into France, as political and economic interests were not hers, Brittany saw her economy decay and her children sent into exile, either to France or on to other continents, and her language slowly eroded step by step. 
But since the beginning of this century, in spite of intense police, judicial and political repression, in spite of forced integration, the Breton language is again spoken by the youth and its economy is in full development, due to new technologies as well as traditional activities. Bretons more and more frequently demand of the French State what other peoples elsewhere have already obtained : autonomy or independence allowing them to determine their present and future. Regrettably, France is far from showing its minorities the same concern as has benefited Scotland, Wales, Catalonia or Euskal Herri. Instead, Breton’s demands for self-determination are met with increasingly powerful repression. 
Nevertheless, we are anxious to emphasize, contrary to what one was able to see in other countries, that the acts of "violence" committed in Brittany have always been limited to symbolic actions. In thirty years, one must regret that three victims were accidentally killed, among whom were two members of Breton commando groups attempting to avoid causing casualties. 
In this context, to this day the Breton independence movement has been the victim, for one year, of a wave of unpublicized repression. Ten people are at present imprisoned, accused of being involved in activities but without any material proof in their file. Five others have been picked up but were then released. There is worse still : more than hundred people, men, women, young people, elderly (a grandmother of about 80 years!) were brutally called on by the "antiterrorist" police and placed in custody for four days and nights under the excuse of being casual acquaintances of those presumed to be members of the independence movements. It was made clear, indeed, during these arrests, that these many were considered only "simple witnesses" free of any criminal charges, but still they were treated as criminals, locked in cells, deprived of any contact with the outside world, left alone for hours under camera surveillance, and then interrogated for hours. And that is not all : systematically, the "antiterrorist" police seized all of the computer equipment which they found at these "simple witness'" homes: computers, power plants, keyboards, monitors, mice, and even printers. These "witnesses" had no means of protecting files indispensable to their educational or professional work. Deprived of their working tools, journalists, teachers, students, a graphologist, none have been able to recover their materials. Some of this equipment has been held by the police for over a year! We are anxious to inform you of these practices, which we consider to be in opposition to the elementary principles of democracy and justice. 
We ask you to intervene, as far as is possible, with the French authorities so that these barbaric practices can be stopped and so that the inequitably seized materials are restored to their rightful owners. Naturally, we are at your disposal for any additional information. We thank you for your full attention in this matter ». 
Annick Lagadec, Journalist, member of the anti-repressive Coordination of Brittany 
For further infos on the situation inBrittany, contact the collective Kengred Ha Krogad at : kengred_ha_krogad@yahoo.fr (we had actually made a typing error in the last issue) or go to the very complete webpage of the Anti-Repressive Committe Brittany (CARB) www.chez.com/carb 

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