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December
2008
For Mutual Aid
& Solidarity 
"...What does it feel like to be condemned to lifein prison? Well, imagine that all your worse fears bebrought together." 
 
(by an Italian life prisoner)The 1st of December 2008 is a date that some ofus wrote with big letters on their agendas: on thisday, the Italian life prisoners will begin to struggle.Not to say that their life would not be a dailystruggle, buried in the dungeons of Italian prisons,with no hope left for their future; indeed, they havenone, since when one speak about life sentence inItaly, this is meant literally: life sentence.However, several life prisoners chose to begin apublic struggle from this date on, by using themean of the hunger strike on relay: to say, thatevery week there will be a different region doingthis strike, until mid-March 2009, where the strikewill end. The mobilization will begin on the 1st ofDecember, where all regions will make a day ofhunger strike.
What do prisoners fight against?
"Not everybody knows what a life sentence reallyis. One is lead to think that it is simply another formof detention like many regimes. One is convincedthat a person condemned to ‘life’ after a certainlylong amount of time will finally be released.Maybe, once this really was the case. But now, ina country where one security emergency isfollowed by another and that is followed by yetanother, lifers have no hope of being set free.This is, in fact, a country where people are inducedinto fearing crime because this fear, rising withinthe population, can help some politicians along intheir career.Crime is considered in fact a sort of ‘illness thatpoliticians promise regularly to ‘cure’.Within this system people who have beencondemned to life imprisonment will really never bereleased!" (from a letter by Alfredo Sole, lifeprisoner in Livorno).If you are sentenced to life in Italy (and you canget sentenced to several life sentence, one of themany aberration of the penal code), this means youwill not be able to accede to any beneficialmeasures: no day leave, no parole, nothing. That'sit simply.It means the State captures your life in its totality,forever.
Support the Italian life prisoners in struggleAgainst life sentence and all prisons
Within the European Union, in theory, thelife penalty no longer exists as allcountries foresee the possibility ofreviewing the sentence and the applica-tion of conditional freedom once a certainamount of time has elapsed since aprisoner was brought into custody. This isgenerally referred to as ’a life sentencesubject to periodical revision’. The amountof time involved varies from one state toanother. It is of 26 years in Italy, 20/25 inthe UK, 20 in Greece, 15 in France,Germany, Austria and Switzerland, 12 inDenmark and 7 years in Ireland.Surely, still an inhuman violence, but atleast one can still see some little light inthe distance.In Italy, somebody decided to switch offall lights.In this country, life sentences becomesreally life covering for many prisoners dueto the fact that offenders who have beencondemned in relation to crimes classifiedas undergoing the 41bis* regime, orwhose offences are considered notcompatible with benefits given by law orare considered as refusing to cooperatewith law enforcement.This is the very moment where the Stateshows what it means by making its mouthfull of talks about so called re-socializa-tion, re-education, reintegration intosociety.Indeed, when talking about life sentence,all the empty promises and the knots arecoming to the comb: one's aims are notthe aforementioned ones, but apply amedieval punishment in a modern form:instead of physical tortures (whichanyway are also contemplated within dailyprison reality, no matter what yoursentence looks like), one found out onewhich can be better resold to the publicopinion, by capturing somebody's life foreternity, eliminating any chance for hope.The State throws its mask.
What do prisoners fight for?
In their words: "Against life sentence:because the hope towards coming freeagain is needed in order to not transforma punishment into a psychological andsocial death; the respect of the article 5 of theuniversal Declaration of Human rights dated1948: nobody should be subjected to tortures,or to a cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment orpunishment; an inquiry Commission of theEuropean Parliament about prisons in Europe."(from a letter signed by Spoleto's life prisoners toall Italian and European prisoners: you can findthis complete letter, as well as others, in ourEntfesselt coming out by mid-November).Surely, as anarchists our aim is not to strugglefor "Rights" in the first place.Still, our aim is also to create awareness andspread solidarity whenever a social, selforganized struggle outbursts and people standup against the present conditions, striving forliberation: in this sense, we see our role inwidening this struggle here on the outside,where we encounter much less limitations thansomeone locked up, in making the struggle ofprisoners ours, in not limiting it to formalrequests. Also, within also a "intermediate"struggle, each individual has the possibility todevelop affinity with alikes and deepen his/hervision of the world and struggle.That is why we understand why prisoners putforward such requests that might appear as notreally revolutionary for many, we explainedalready in our text about the hunger strikehappened in German prisons in August this year(to be found in
Entfesselt 
, September/Octoberor on the websites of 325 or ABC Berlin).We believe the role of anarchists and otherrebels to lie into radicalizing social struggleswhenever they happen, as far as we can, pushthem to their limits.
A first experience of struggle?
Italian prisons saw a high and radical level ofstruggle for many years, especially during the70's and the beginning of 80's.However, several factors contributed to breaksolidarity inside the walls: State-planneddiffusion of hard-drugs, individualization,repentance, disassociation, blackmailing ofrebel prisoners by introducing beneficialmeasures upon good behavior, psychologicalcontrol by experts and many others.No different to the development occurred in allthe rest of the world (although we refer hereespecially on the its "western" part).
 
Therefore during the last years, struggles reducedor have been mostly limited to support specificprisoners.One year ago, prisoners decided they hadenough. One year ago, life prisoners stood upagainst their situation and criticized prison itself,by calling for an undetermined hunger strike untilthey would have reached at least some of theirrequests: the latter being not especially abnormal,since they "merely" asked that a discussion on thetopic of abolishment of the life sentence shouldbe brought on in parliament.However, the Italian State and its judicialauthorities couldn't be bothered, and life prisonersdecided to stop after roughly two weeks, as soonas they have realized that there would not be anyecho of their struggle reaching the ears of theones in power.Many prisoners believed that journalists, sympa-thetic politicians and democratic judicial authori-ties would have spent at least a word in theirfavor.However, this sounds to us rather as a contradic-tion in terms: prisoners are worth for the press onlysince the latter can endlessly reconfirm theirscribbler role by writing about the explosion ofcriminality and its gruesome protagonists;prisoners are worth for the politicians, only whenthey need to use them as scapegoats in order to justify their politics of social control, allegedlybased on the "enormous" arise of the criminalrate, despite the fact this actually decreases andit is anyway produced by the present social(un)conditions; prisoners are worth for democraticmagistrates, only since the latter make their livingout of them.All in all it proved again what anarchists and otherpeople who came at daggers drawn with thissociety say permanently: do not believe suchvultures, believe rather all the ones who struggleon your side carrying no other interest thandeveloping relations in struggle in order tooverthrow the present system.
A few words about the situation in Germany...
On August this year, German prisoners alsodecided to undertake a struggle against theirconditions and prison at all.After many years of silence, a self organizedstruggle began inside the walls, undertaken by theprisoners association I.vI. and anarchist individu-alities: one week of collective hunger strikeagainst their condition of detention and prisonreality.From outside, several people tried to show theirsolidarity in different ways.A new situation, which lighted the spark of a new,potential situation of rupture inside Germanprisons, generally dominated by apathy andconform behavior, beside few outstandingexceptions.To show that this was not a papertiger, Germanprisoners call as well to support the hunger strikeof Italian life sentence prisoners by undertaking aswell a hunger strike: because internationalsolidarity can not remain an empty word.In the words of Gabriel Pombo da Silva,Spanish anarchist imprisoned since 4years in Aachen:"...The German molecular prisons(exported in Spain on the beginning of the80's) carry a very precise instrumentalfunctionality: to classify, to put in order, todiscipline and disassociate prisonersthrough dispersion, isolation andindividualization. Inside a "space", whereindividuals neither know, nor recognizethemselves as "equals", it is difficult that a"feeling of community" might arise, butrather one of indifference, competivity,egoism...(...)Inside German prisons (more and moreimitated on an international level), one willbe divided from his/her friends andcomrades already from the very beginningof his/her reclusion (through dispersion);than, once inside, one studies withattention what "they" call "psychologicalprofiles" of prisoners, so that they will notbe able to develop any relation of affinitywhich might turn problematic for theadministration.(...)For these reasons and many more we,some prisoners, pretend to create acollective answer by undertaking ahunger strike, to open a common spaceof struggle which would overcomeatomization and isolation.(...)For now, we are getting ready for thehunger strike which will take place in Italynext December for life prisoners...We believe this to be a good occasion inorder to give an impulse to anti prisonstruggles and proposals...(...)...At the same time, the comrades of I.vI.are preparing a specific dossier about theproposals and the very contest of germanprison reality...We believe the diffusion ofsuch proposals to be very important forthe discussion and the debate on aninternational level..."If prisoners are able to show theirsolidarity, under the conditions they areforced to, then here on the outside wehave not many excuses left for not to act.
What does the word solidarity standsfor?
Last year, the only ones who activelysupport the struggle of life prisoners inItaly, beside their relatives, have been theanarchists.This year, after the disillusion produced bythe scarce attention their struggle foundwithin the public sphere, life prisoners donot rely any longer on empty promises butcalled for a struggle that looks for thesupport of all the ones who repute lifesentence an aberration, prison a monster and feelsolidarious with them, a struggle to be undertaken bythe means, one feels the closest to.Some people will make a hunger strike as well, as itwas last year where several prisoners from othercountries solidarized as well: this year there havebeen already some call to solidarity from Spanishprisoners as well as from other European ones.Some relatives participated and will participate again,some non-life prisoners, some concerned individualsand more. However, the hunger strike is not to beseen as the only mean one can support this struggle,neither it has been asked for: everything which canraise attention and put pressure on authorities inorder to express our unsatisfactoriness with thesituation and our active solidarity with this struggle islegitimate and welcomed by prisoners.We plan to host an info event about the ongoingstruggle and a rally in front of the Italian embassy.Check out for these dates and, above all, createyour own moment of active solidarity!As Carmelo Musumeci, imprisoned in Spoleto wrote,"He who refuses to struggle is a useless man indeedas well as being someone who places his future inthe hands of those that are worse than himself."We can only underline such evident truth.Active solidarity with the struggle of Italian andworldwide prisoners!Against life sentence, against a life inside a prisonsociety!
ABC Berlin
*
Art. 41 bis: Is the article within the Italian legal system that allow the Ministry of Justice to suspend the application of rules and regulations normally valid in prison and to apply a different regime tothose prisoners who are accused of participating inorganized criminal organizations, terrorist groups or take part in or organize prison revolts.
325@hush.ai
325collective.com
325mail
c/o ABC
PO BOX 74
BRIGHTON
BN1 4ZQ 
UK 
Anti-Copyright Network 2008
 
On SabotageOn SabotageOn SabotageOn SabotageOn SabotageConsidered asConsidered asConsidered asConsidered asConsidered asOne of the FineOne of the FineOne of the FineOne of the FineOne of the FineArtsArtsArtsArtsArts
(On Tuesday the 11th of November 20 people were arrested in Paris, Rouen and Tarnac under suspicion of having sabo- taged several train lines on the 8th of November. In a coordinated attack metal rods were jammed against overhead power cables, taking out trains on lines north, east and south of the capital,causing chaos to the French rail network.Five people are still being held and a total of nine people are being charged with criminal association with the aim of terrorism and sabotage, and one of the defendants is charged with being the leader of a terrorist group. Police claim that the group has had contact with people across Europe in countries such as Germany, Greece, Belgium and the UK.The group had been under heavy police surveillance since April after the French police were alerted by the FBI after some members had tried to cross the US border illegally.) 
The following text was written by a number of companions in the context of the arrestslast November 11th. It may be distributedfreely and widely in any form. In a time of "crisis," when the State is showering thecapitalists with billions of dollars, itattempting once more to isolate a few "badrebels" to better eliminate them all. Wewon't play this dupes' game.You'd have to be really blind not to seesabotage as the classical weapon of theexploited. And you'd have to have a prettyshort memory to forget that in every socialwar, many a rebel refuses to wait for everyone to move before expressing his or her anger.From the riots of November 2005 to theCPE riots of spring 2006, from factoryoccupations and kidnappings of directorsto the numerous acts of sabotage duringthe railway workers' movement of Novem-ber 2007, it's clear for a lot of people thatwe won't have an end to our situation of misery and exploitation by begging for it.In this prison society, we're expected tobelieve we're in the best of possibleworlds: commodity democracy. And theytry to force us to believe it with tazer shocksand ballots. The wars and the poisoning of the planet for money are nonetheless aclear reminder that capitalism is a death-dealing system and that the State is not afriend, but an enemy.And so we must fight back, todestroy what destroys us. Struggleindividually and collectively wher-ever we are for a world emanci-pated from the bonds of exploitationand domination. It is not their penalcodes and morality that must dictatewhat we must do, but the rage andethics of each and every one of us.On the 11th of November, tenpersons were placed under arrestduring a new operation by theMinistry of Terror, and accused of sabotaging the tension wires of SNCF trains during the prior weekend. Journalist cops, politicos,and jackals came from all sides tohurriedly denounce an imaginary"anarcho-autonomist" movement.On the same pretext of "associationof criminals with terrorist aims,"three comrades have already beenarrested, and some held for over 9months, accused of an attempt toburn a police vehicle in Paris in May2007, during the explosions of anger that arose to greet the lastpresidential election.In a time of "crisis," when the State isshowering the capitalists withbillions of dollars, it attempting oncemore to isolate a few "bad rebels" tobetter eliminate them all. But ithardly matters whether they're guiltyor innocent; we'll leave thosecategories to the robe-wearingtoads and their sustainers.Because in the same way as thepassion for freedom can't becaptured in an acronym, whatdomination most fears is a diffuseand anonymous replication of theseattacks. Solidarity against Stateterrorism, by all means anyoneconsiders adequate.Let us derail the train of everydayroutine.
November 12th, 2008.November 12th, 2008.November 12th, 2008.November 12th, 2008.November 12th, 2008.
Terrorism or Terrorism or Terrorism or Terrorism or Terrorism or Tragicomedy?Tragicomedy?Tragicomedy?Tragicomedy?Tragicomedy?
On the morning of November 11,150 police officers, most of whichbelonged to the anti-terroristbrigades, surrounded a village of 350 inhabitants on the Millevachesplateau, before raiding a farm inorder to arrest nine young people(who ran the local grocery store andtried to revive the cultural life of thevillage). Four days later, these ninepeople were sent before an anti-terrorist judge and "accused of criminal conspiracywith terrorist intentions." The newspapersreported that the Ministry of the Interior and the Secretary of State "had congratu-lated local and state police for their diligence." Everything is in order, or so itwould appear. But let's try to examine thefacts a little more closely and grasp thereasons and the results of this "diligence."First the reasons: the young people under investigation "were tracked by the policebecause they belonged to the ultra-leftand the anarcho autonomous milieu." Asthe entourage of the Ministry of the Interior specifies, "their discourse is very radicaland they have links with foreign groups."But there is more: certain of the suspects"participate regularly in political demon-strations," for example, "in protests againstEDVIG [a database of "potential suspects"held by the French police] and against theintensification of laws restricting immigra-tion." So political activism (this is the onlypossible meaning of linguistic monstrosi-ties such as "anarcho autonomousmilieu"), the active exercise of politicalfreedoms, and the employment of aradical discourse are therefore sufficientreasons to call in the anti-terrorist divisionof the police (SDAT) and the centralintelligence office of the Interior (DCRI).But anyone possessing a minimum of political conscience could not helpsharing the concerns of these youngpeople when faced with the degradationsof democracy entailed by the EDVIGdatabase, biometrical technologies, andthe hardening of immigration laws.As for the results, one might expect thatinvestigators found weapons, explosivesand Molotov cocktails on the farm inMillevaches. Far from it. SDAT officersdiscovered "documents containingdetailed information on railway transporta-tion, including exact arrival and departuretimes of trains." In plain French: an SNCFtrain schedule. But they also confiscated"climbing gear." In simple French: aladder, such as one might find in anycountry house.Now let's turn our attention to the suspectsand, above all, to the presumed head of this terrorist gang, "a 33 year old leader from a well-off Parisian background, livingoff an allowance from his parents." This isJulien Coupat, a young philosopher who(with some friends) formerly published
Tiqqun 
, a journal whose political analyses– while no doubt debatable – countamong the most intelligent of our time. Iknew Julien Coupat during that periodand, from an intellectual point of view, Icontinue to hold him in high esteem.Let's move on and examine the only
m
of 00

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