INTERNATIONAL ANARCHIST MOVEMENT-SERBIA:

STATEMENT OF THE ASI ON ARRESTS OF ITS MEMBERS:

Molly has given a brief report before on recent arrests of members of the Serbian Anarcho Syndicalist Initiative (ASI) on trumped up charges. The following is a statement of the ASI on these arrests transmitted via a rather convoluted process that may actually be both necessary and effective. The original source is a blog set up via a Greek site Squat.gr. Given the recent actions of the Greek government I don't know how wise this is, but I'm sure that there will be many others to stand in line (myself included) if charges are brought against the Greek site. ASI Solidarity is hosted on this site. The following came to Molly's attention via the Anarkismo website. They, in turn, sourced it from the Polish anarchist news service Centrum Informacji Anarchistycznej. As per my usual impolite fashion I have edited the following post for English grammar- as best I can. The Serbian ASI, by the way, is the Serbian branch of the anarchosyndicalist international, the IWA-AIT.

@@@@@@@@@@
Statement of Anarcho-Syndicalist Initiative on Arrests of their Members:

On September, 4th 2009 District Court in Belgrade decided that arrested members of ASI will be held for thirty days in detention. Our comrades are accused of an act of international terrorism.

The Union Confederation “Anarcho-syndicalist Initiative” found out about the attack on the Greek embassy, and of the organisation that took the responsibility for this act, through the media.

We used this opportunity to remind the public once again that these methods of individual political struggle are not the methods of anarcho-syndicalism, quite the contrary – we proclaim our political positions publicly and through our work we seek to bring the masses to the syndicalist movement and all the libertarian and progressive organisations.

Wanting to brutally suppress its fiercest critics the state, through its mechanisms of repression, acted with banal logic and identifies as suspects those who explicitly stated their libertarian beliefs, and by their imprisonment ends the case and gives a false picture of its efficiency to the public.(a very important point. If you can't get the perpetrators as least get scapegoats-Molly )

The unscrupulous actions of regime’s organs can be observed from the first moments of arrest, unlawful searches of their apartments, intimidation of their families to the extreme charges of international terrorism.

Given the fact that we do not support the acts of now famous anarchist group “Crni Ilija” (Black Sun) we still cannot characterise what happened as “international terrorism”, because terrorism, by definition, entails threats to the lives of civilians, whereas in this case no one was even hurt and only symbolic material damage was done.

It is clear that this state produced farce is just one way of intimidating anyone who decides to point out the injustice and hopelessness of contemporary society.

In times of general social numbness individuals reach for the most unbelievable, sometimes even self-destructive, actions in order to break through the media blockade and to put their case in the centre of attention – let us remember the workers who cut off and ate their own fingers, or, for example, the unlucky, distressed man who threatened to activate a hand grenade in the building of the Presidency of Serbia – that is, trying to shed some light on their problems in a broader social space.

Lets not allow them to persuade us that one symbolic act of solidarity, even if expressed in a certainly bad manner, together with any other act of rebellion of those who are left with no rights should be treated as an antisocial act and an act of terrorism.

We express solidarity with the arrested comrades and their families and demand the truth about this case!

FREEDOM FOR ANARCHO-SYNDICALISTS!

ANARCHO-SYNDICALIST INITIATIVE

Sept. 5, 2009

Sources:

http://cia.bzzz.net/statement_of_anarcho_syndicalist_in...mbers

An independent blog (not affiliated with ASI) covering the news regarding the arrests in Serbia with updates in English and Greek:

http://asisolidarity.squat.gr/

@@@@@@@@@@

MOLLY NOTES:

The exact "offense" with which the members of the ASI are charged is really one of doing nothing but reporting an act of vandalism without saying that the vandals might actually have something to complain about. From the point of view of the Serbian state it did not matter that the ASI explicitly condemned the tactics of the vandals. As in many other states across the world the government is only satisfied with total agreement with their own way of describing the motives of either "terrorists" or even minor vandals. The apotheosis of this was the insistence of the US government that terrorist attacks on the USA were because "they hate us for our freedoms". This, of course, is silly, but it was (and is) believed by a large segment of the American population who cannot understand how bombing people gets them pissed off.

What the ASI was charged with was something that I have certainly done many times on this blog-despite my determination to not give any publicity to the nutters in the USA who have identity crises and think they can solve them via vandalism-ie report an incident, decry the tactics used but remind the reader that there are real social issues behind the "incident". I've done this over and over, and other rational leftists-anarchist and otherwise- have done it to the tune of millions of times over the years. Others, not even leftist, have also committed this "crime" to the tune of tens of millions". It's what is called reality outside of the ambitions of a state to give only its own point of view. If for no other reason the comrades of the ASI deserve everyone's support because they are simply telling the truth.

@@@@@@@@@@

FURTHER IMPORTANT NOTE:

The ASI Solidarity site has published a caution fregarding possible solidarity actions. Due to the present legal situation of the imprisoned comrades it is wise that others refrain from actions other than publishing the ASI statement for the moment.