In this issue mainly detailed agenda for Amsterdam.A bit about animals rights,renovation of Vrankrijk one from the most active squats etc.A lot off about Michael Ossey and hipocrisy of christians from CDA and CU
On 4 October 2007, immigration and police raided a flat in Amsterdam ZO, resulting in the death of the 34-year-old Ghanaian man Mike Osei, who fell from the 7th floor of the raided flat during the raid. Mike had spent several months in detention for the sole reason of not having the right documents, and had just been released. He was terrified of being incarcerated again without support or knowledge of a release date.
Only a few months before, on 16 June, police raided a concert by a popular West African musician in café Het Vervolg, arresting 111 of the 250 guests. One hundred and three undocumented migrants of West African origin were detained and 70 were issued with deportation orders two days after their arrest. By now, almost all of them have been deported.
The death of Mike and a series of immigration raids on places of work and in churches and homes of people without valid residency permits, have started to create deep unrest within black communities in the Netherlands, be they Filipino's, Africans, Latinos or Asians. We have seen a continuous increase in human rights violations at all levels of life as a direct consequence of the restrictive policies of the Dutch government. It is notable that police are now targeting the few safe havens that are left for undocumented migrants in the Netherlands, including churches, in an apparent attempt to spread fear amongst the community and show them that they can regard no place as safe.
The African organisation Africa Roots Movements and the Dutch solidarity fund XminY have therefore decided to remember Mike and give his family the space to mourn his death, which was a direct result of the Dutch immigration policy. On 4 October, after a remembrance ceremony, a public panel with community activists will give an insight into the problem of police repression and fear in the migrant community from arrest, abuse and deportation, and present strategies on how to deal with the situation. Victims will talk about their experiences, and a survivor of the fire at the detention centre Schiphol which killed 11 people will talk about the inadequate official response and imprisonment of a victim of the fire.
On 5 October, we have invited Cilius Victor, an activist from the London-based Newham Monitoring Project to talk about the last 20 years of experience with racism and police repression against black communities in the UK, and how they have organised themselves against it. There will be space to ask questions about the problems they faced and how they surmounted them, and an of exchange ideas on how it might be possible to set up monitoring and support groups in the Netherlands to report, react and fight against the fear in migrant communities and seek justice against discrimination and repression.
You are all heartily invited to join us and share your experiences and views.