Critique of ‘Do Not Support the ALF’

By Jake Conroy (SHAC 7), from Because We Must:

I don’t tweet or tumbl or any of that stuff, so I don’t really have a place to put this besides here. Nor can I contact websites like Animal Liberation Frontline or NAALPO due to my legal issues. But this ridiculous article about how we need to do away with ALF supporters has been heavy on my mind. So I thought I would share my thoughts. Feel free to share on your social media outlets if you feel inspired to:

While I share in the anonymous author’s desire to see more action and less talk, the arguments laid out in their article are tragically flawed, dangerous, and counterproductive (and somewhat laughable as it is being posted on blogs and all things social media, thus creating just the opposite affect of the original argument). I have spent awhile thinking about and being angered over the article and how best to respond. Ultimately, my own personal story, which I think is fairly commonplace for a lot of us, was the best rebuttal:

I think my story is pretty typical for anyone coming up in the mid 90′s. I moved to the Northwest in 1995 when I was 19. I quickly became vegan and interested in politics. I didn’t know any other activists or even vegans at the time. However, I found myself captivated by hardcore and punk music, and zines that espoused the lifestyle. I would go to places like Fallout Records and dig through the dusty box they had in the corner, full of old magazines. Here I would find old Sea Shepherd journals and issues of The Underground (the ALF Supporters Group newsletter). I would go to hardcore shows and pick up literature at tables. I spent hours in used bookstores digging through the history sections for books on radical activism. I would spend days pouring over these materials, reading and rereading them, and dreaming and scheming.

Eventually I would find my way into my local animal rights group. I worked with the Northwest Animal Rights Network in Seattle that was a mix of the greatest group of people. Our tight-knit core group of 10 or so had retired naval lawyers in their 70s down to punk rock teens with mohawks. But the one thing we all had in common was that we unabashedly supported the ALF. One of the first demonstrations I ever went to was an ALF support demo after a local Honey Bee Ham restaurant had its windows smashed in. Myself and a friend started passing out information on animal rights and animal liberation at the local hardcore shows. We would be doing tables upwards of 3-4 times a week. There wasn’t much in the way of ALF support merchandise at the time, so we screened pro-ALF shirts and hoodies we got from the thrift store and sold them to cover the costs of photocopies. While I certainly don’t attribute it entirely or even remotely to the two of us, there was definitely a genuine feeling of support for direct action and the ALF within the community.

Over the next several years I would redirect my focus from simple protests to civil disobedience, to direct action in the form of whale hunt sabs off the coast of Washington, to helping get the SHAC USA office off the ground and working on the anti-HLS campaign for 5 years. During that time I also worked on and helped start some of the biggest and most important direct action support magazines of those times. Those magazines would help build, among other things, community support for imprisoned activists around the world. That support would come in many forms, including leaflets and magazines, t shirts, videos, benefits, and support funds. Eventually myself and 5 friends would be found guilty in the SHAC 7 trial. I would be sentenced to 48 months in federal prison, partly because we chose to publicly share ideas. Controversial ideas, like supporting direct action and the ALF.

All of this started with zines I found in a box in the corner of a record store. It led to high-fives with friends, wearing black shirts and taking goofy pictures with disposable cameras at hardcore shows (that’s what we did before Instagram). I started out as a kid listening to music and reading propaganda. I never was a press officer, or a convicted (or not convicted) operative, nor am I disabled. But I think I’ve accomplished some really exciting things in my 17 years as an activist – from getting fur out of major retailers in Seattle, to using direct action to stop the killing of whales off the coast of Washington to organizing with SHAC USA, one of the most successful grassroots animal rights campaigns in our history. And I started out exactly as the kid you are saying needs to stop their “madness”.

Do you know who else started out the same way I did? Being inspired by listening to the music you want to end and reading the zines (now online, called blogs) you would like to do away with? ALF activists like Rod Coronado, Keith Mann, Peter Young. Andy Stepanian, Darius Fullmer. Do you know how ALL of those folks survived their prison experiences? By receiving books and letters and photos and donations by all those people who you suggest do nothing more than “work and watch movies with friends”.

The bottom line is, for over 40 years there has been ALF support work going on all over the world. (Please learn the history of that work at Conflict Gypsy) That work has created a community of people that might not be exactly what you want them to be, but ultimately will support those people you revere so much when they need it the most. Their simple presence will keep that community around, will foster that support when its needed, and keep the issues as relevant as possible. Of course we want more action, less words. But ultimately we need both, because that’s what will keep these ideologies going throughout the peaks and the troughs, the highs and the lows. To not show your support publicly for direct action is what may be the final blow to one of the most important elements of the animal rights movement.

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Athens, the Revolutionary Struggle trial: Statement of anarchist Jean Weir to the terror court of Korydallos

Revolutionary Struggle are an anarchist-communist urban guerilla group. Members and co-accused are ‘on trial’ by the Greek state – more info here.

Jean Weir is a insurrectional anarchist from the UK who was invited by the members of RS to speak at their trial, which of course they chose to make into a ‘trial’ of the state and the capitalist system. Jean’s publishing/distribution project Elephant Editions has a website here.

INTERNATIONAL REVOLUTIONARY SOLIDARITY & INSURRECTIONAL GUERILLA STRUGGLE

SOLIDARITY WITH THE MEMBERS AN CO-ACCUSED OF THE REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE CASE

HONOR FOREVER TO FALLEN FIGHTER LAMBROS FOUNDAS

– dmp

TRANSCRIPT OF STATEMENT (10/09/2012):

I wish to clarify right away that I stand here as an enemy of the State and society. Far from being a lively community sharing social well-being and the joy of life, what is referred to as society is no more than the dull organisation of inequality and exploitation through social roles and forbiddance. The law is the barbed wire that holds everything in place, and has been internalised to such an extent that it forms the unconscious basis of daily habit and routine even for those who apply it. The media form opinions to maintain consensus and the delegation of individual responsibility to that organ of institutionalised terror, the State. The State, which includes its subjects, is at the basis of every social relation at the present time, including the one here in this court today.

I have come to stand face to face with the enemy inside this bastion of State terror because I was invited by the three comrades of Revolutionary Struggle. I haven’t come to enter into dialogue concerning these comrades or any others. My presence here is an act of solidarity and a continuation of my struggle as an anarchist. At least the present judicial proceeding has discarded every vestige of the democratic swindle, revealing the true essence of power. It’s impossible to pass over the fact that this trial is taking place inside a prison, the greatest crime perpetrated by man over man, and the physical proximity of the judge and the gaoler is an unusual if unintentional declaration of truth. The judge is nothing without the gaoler. The gaoler is nothing without the judge. They are one and bear equal responsibility for their actions. Terrorists and criminals are the servants of the State and capital, not those struggling to survive or fighting against a world of strife, war, poverty and oppression.

It is in the context of this struggle that I first heard of the anarchist Nikos Maziotis. He was in the extreme and dangerous phase of a hunger strike to enforce his refusal to wear a uniform and become a killer in the pay of the State. At the time many anarchists in Italy where I was living had also refused to do military service, choosing to go to prison rather than join the armed force that keeps humanity divided into classes and intervenes violently to extinguish any attempt at liberation. But also and above all because military service is one of the State’s weapons for building model citizens devoid of personality, individuality and their own way of thinking against which it is necessary to rebel and refuse.

I was already aware of the anarchist struggle, of the importance of the anarchist struggle in Greece alongside the exploited, the students, the bus drivers, schoolteachers, the people of the villages of Halkidiki, etc and had read inspiring reports of their actions and also about the State repression against them. But it was Nikos Maziotis, who without knowing it, was to be the propulsive element in my coming to Greece in person. It was on the occasion of his trial in 1999 that I came to Athens for the first time, to attend the court in solidarity with him. It was then that I discovered the wild beauty of the Greek anarchist comrades, their passion for freedom that found immediate expression in a thousand ways and never ceases to grow and intensify, inspiring and igniting free spirits all over the planet. Two things in particular impressed me on that occasion. First and foremost the unmitigated courage and dignity of Nikos Maziotis as he faced the perpetrators of power and privilege. His statement to the court, his affirmations as a man, an individual, a revolutionary, an anarchist, were made looking into the barrel of the gun of judgement without any concern for the consequences in terms of the years he was facing locked up in a cell. What he said that day is a classic of anarchist theory concerning the need for violent attack on the class enemy in first person and I personally have contributed to spreading it in the English language (the text, I mean, hopefully also the attacks). It has inspired comrades and rebels all over the world. What also impressed me and has affected my life ever since was the immediacy of so many comrades’ action in solidarity, without mediation, without the taboos about so-called violence that put a brake on the just anger of the exploited. They expressed solidarity in its only authentic manifestation, by continuing the struggle, the conscious attack on the profits of the bosses and the instruments of repression, even and above all when the class enemy was out in all its force to protect the property and arrogance of the rulers of the planet. Each with their own means, each with their own responsibility.

Armed struggle is on trial. Anarchists also. For any struggle to be worthy of the name it must be armed and self-organised, far from any delegation to the self-proclaimed representatives of the workers movement who have shamelessly betrayed the latter and collaborated with the bosses by reigning in the bad passions of those who have nothing to lose but their chains. Anarchists are against hierarchy and this also applies to the weapons used in the struggle. The weaponry of the anarchist combines the idea, the concept of freedom and the need to destroy not only inequality and poverty but also and at the same time, authority, hierarchy and obedience. They have the capacity to organise themselves and go to the attack without leaders or led, and push others to do the same. Words, stones, pistols, fire, dynamite, Molotov cocktails, graffiti, sledgehammers, hacksaws, theory, analysis, identification of the class enemy as it changes in order to stay the same, machine-guns, spray cans, bazookas are some of the weapons for the self-management of the attack.. (I forgot the catapult, la fionda..) All combine in destructive playful alchemy far from the deathlike logic of judgement. Even when a class enemy is struck down, it is just something to be done and let’s get it over with.

Anarchists abhore the blind institutionalised violence of the State with its arsenal of uniformed robots, tasers, tanks, drones, poisonous gases, flash grenades, truncheons, jackboots, armoured vehicles, cctv cameras, helicopters flying over our heads, courts, prisons, concentration camps, bomber planes, missiles, institutionalised religion, the media, the manipulation of people’s minds, etc. Only the State has the power to send men to their death or to kill, always with the blessing of the priest, after instilling them with patriotism and xenophobia from birth. Greece was the first country to use napalm against the guerrilla in the mountains. Now, irony of history, it uses nerve gas imported from the Israeli State which, after evicting millions of Palestinians from their homes to survive in camps, claims its legitimacy from the gassing of 6 million Jews by another State over half a century ago.

Anarchists are against prisons even for their enemies and know well that when the present setup of the means of production is destroyed and social wealth belongs to everyone, to each according to their needs, from each according to their desires, there will be little cause for strife. The State will do anything to obstruct the struggle for freedom in whatever form it takes, whatever instrument it uses. Since the beginning of the anarchist movement around the middle of the nineteenth century the organs of power have always reacted particularly violently against anarchists because the State, any State, be it red, black or the multicoloured version of social democracy, cannot tolerate freedom, be it in the form of ideas or in the self-organised action of the exploited. I could give many examples but I think we are short of time and I’ll carry on. And of course not only anarchists have been massacred by the State but the exploited in any attempt they have made to self organise their attack against oppression, and we saw this the other day in South Africa when 27 miners were gunned down in a demonstration against the conditions in the mine.

In the space of a century and a half the number of anarchists who have been imprisoned, exiled, guillotined, garrotted, electrocuted, tortured, gunned down in action, shot by firing squads, beaten to a pulp in the street and left to die in a cell, pushed out of police station windows or killed in traffic ‘accidents’, add up to thousands, and often the written word of the anarchist revolutionary has been as severely punished as the bullet. Far from showing signs of penitence or begging for mercy these proud fighters faced death as they had faced life, fearlessly, with a proud cry of Long live anarchy! Long live freedom! That is why the exterminatory delirium of the State is a battle lost before it begins. For every anarchist and rebel slain by the State thousands more spring up out of the nowhere of the uncertain, and the undecided. And that was visible in 2008 in this country, something which inspired people all over the world. Every second an anarchist spends in prison his spirit strengthens, expands beyond the walls and nourishes the solidarity that he or she inspires.

The anarchist struggle is qualitative not quantitative. Its aim is not to control and lead the masses into battle or act in their place but to push the exploited and excluded to act in first person to attack the class enemy and its structures. Sometimes it’s the other way around, a mass explosion of rage erupts after some exalted lackey of the State takes the law into his own hands and guns down a schoolboy, a rioter, a respected elder in the ghetto or a kid in the banlieu. When anarchists put themselves alongside the exploited it is not as their saviours but to fight together with them to extend and widen their attack, to turn riots into insurrections. Sometimes reality acts the other way, the rebels surpassing the anarchists in their destructive fury. In recent years in Greece and in many parts of the world there has been a proliferation of direct attacks on the structures of capital and the State by small groups or individuals. Unlike the seventies and eighties when capitalism was undergoing ferocious restructuring that was responded to in part, not only, by highly structured marxist-leninist armed struggle groups, from the nineties the attack has taken a more flexible form by anarchist groups based on affinity, often with no name or acronym. The workerist element of the struggle more or less disappeared along with the industrial working class due to the introduction of robotisation and real time operations thanks to information technology and capital’s resulting ability to exploit starvation wages on the other side of the planet.

The armed group Revolutionary Struggle appeared in 2003 at a time when there was an anti-terrorist frenzy globally, which in Greece coincided with the capture of the 17th of November group followed by true media delirium. At first their targets were symbols of authority and the State – police, the American Embassy, the Ministry of Finance and Labour, and also an attempt on the minister for Public Order who had been responsible for upgrading the repression. They acted directly without needing the alibi of the masses in order to strike the common enemy, for their own dignity and coherence. When in 2008 the so-called financial crisis became official along with the responsibility of the State and the banking corporations, their actions turned to financially-related targets such as the Stock Exchange, Citibank, Eurobank, etc.

During the whole period the group published extensive analyses which were combined with their actions and contained a strong class position, exhorting the class of exploited to rise and attack those responsible. They are a part of this new complexive reality of the struggle against capital and the State, one that is pushing towards a self-organised revolutionary outlet. Their choice of armed struggle in the specific sense is not presented as an end in itself but simply as a tool to bring the revolutionary perspective to the fore and present the hypothesis of the need for immediate attack in an unequivocal discourse addressed both to the anarchist movement and the wider movement of the exploited.

The comrades who have claimed responsibility for this organisation are individuals who have been active fighters in the struggles of the anarchist movement in Greece in its many forms for decades and are well known in the movement and beyond. In the face of the media outrage and scaremongering following their arrests they came out and proudly claimed the organisation, decriminalising it in the face of the terroristic attack of the media on the minds of the population in order to prepare the terrain for consensus and support for their political and physical annihilation at the hands of the repressive organs of the State. They have written volumes explaining the reasons for the attacks and the need for social rebellion particularly at this moment where, as in many other parts of Europe and the world, the organised crime of State, bosses and banks has led to further extortion from the dispossessed who are now at breaking point. Their message is that of the need for direct attack, that the structures of capital and the State are not invincible.

The words and the actions of the Revolutionary Solidarity group [eh, you mean the Revolutionary Struggle? interpretor] of the Revolutionary Struggle group, (yes… it’s the same thing… solidarity is the struggle and the struggle is solidarity… ) have been translated into many languages in the dimension of the continuation and intensification of revolutionary solidarity in the dimension of attack. This has led to multiform actions, from banner-hanging, sabotage, incendiary attacks on banks and the structures of repression, discussions, international meetings, publications, posters, etc. and have been one of the recent sources of inspiration to anarchists everywhere.

At a time when life has been mortgaged to Capital and become little more than a question of accountancy where every day people are bombarded by the media with figures in billions while they are struggling to stay alive and feed their children, Revolutionary Struggle has had considerable impact on those who see the crisis not as something that has to be readdressed and corrected, but faced head on and destroyed, along with work and the whole economy. Poverty will never be eliminated until we destroy work because it is the condition that forces people to spend their lives doing soul-destroying jobs at starvation wages.

Millions of young people all over the planet are made to feel useless and without hope due to spreading unemployment. It’s time to destroy work as a very concept and take back our lives. Work is a crime, an ideological and physical imposition on the great mass of human beings, animals, and the earth itself, for the benefit of a small percentage of glitterati, but believed in and defended by the whole social set-up, exploiters and exploited alike. In the words of Herman J. Schuurman one of the founders of the Mokergroep, a group of young proletarians in 1923 wrote this: We want to create as free people, not work as slaves; therefore we will destroy the system of slavery. Capitalism only exists because of the work of the workers, thus we will sabotage it and put an end to it. If we are not working towards the destruction of capital, we are working towards the destruction of humanity! We do not want to be destroyed by capitalism, so capitalism will have to be destroyed by us.

I don’t know if the Revolutionary Struggle comrades are advocating the destruction of work, but that is where the totality of the struggle for the destruction of the existent takes us, without compromise or half measures.

=======================================================

A short background on the Revolutionary Struggle case

On March 10th, 2010, anarchist comrade Lambros Foundas was murdered after an armed scuffle with police forces. Those were the days when Greece was first subjected to the stifling scrutiny of the IMF/ECB/EU Troika, those were the days when Lambros Foundas, member of the Revolutionary Struggle group, lost his life in a shootout with the police during a preparatory action aimed against the political and economic elite that ravages the planet, and plunders and exsanguinates social wealth globally, relegating human life to rock bottom.

After a month and amid a climate of terror-hysteria, in April 2010 the police made preemptive detentions in order to dismantle the Revolutionary Struggle group, and also arrested and imprisoned anarchists Kostas Gournas, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa, who took political responsibility for their participation in the organization.

Simultaneously, anarchists Vaggelis Stathopoulos, Christoforos Kortesis and Sarantos Nikitopoulos were caught and sent to prison. The latter three categorically deny any participation in the organization ever since their arrest, stating that their prosecution concerns their years-long involvement in subversive projects, their political affiliation to the anarchist/anti-authoritarian space and their comradely relationships.

Kostas Katsenos is also charged with participation in the group, and ever since the period of these pretrial incarcerations an arrest warrant was pending against him, too.

The system wanted to deliver a decisive blow to the organization, deeming Revolutionary Struggle as a threat; therefore, it expanded its offensive through the aforementioned arrests so as to crush a wider part of the subversive movement.

After six months, in the context of this expansion of the repressive offensive, dozens of comrades from the anarchist/anti-authoritarian milieu were called to testify and underwent interrogations, along with friends and relatives of the six imprisoned anarchists.

The vindictiveness of repression mechanisms was proved once again, when the State went as far as to charge Marie Beraha—spouse of Kostas Gournas—with participation in the group. This prosecution is a purely vindictive act against Kostas Gournas, in an effort to curb his combatant stance.

On October 5th, 2011, the RS case trial got underway in the special court of Koridallos prisons, in a closed room, withcomplete absence of any publicity. While the mass media always seemed eager to aid the repressive offensive and state propaganda, nowadays they keep silent—in a provocative way and under a political mandate—about anything related to the court proceeding of the RS case.

On the one hand, the regime is conducting a trial against its political adversaries and wants to gag any message of struggle and to distort its meaning. On the other hand, the three comrades, who took political responsibility for their participation in the organization, have defended its actions and political plan. At the same, with their statements in court, all defendants in this case have converted the trial sessions into a harsh reproach upon the political-economic system of wretchedness and exploitation, unveiling the nature of laws and specific treatments that are enforced against those who have the strength to resist.

It must be emphasized that none of the accused comrades is currently imprisoned. Vaggelis Stathopoulos, Sarantos Nikitopoulos and Chistoforos Kortesis were ordered released after 12 months of pretrial incarceration. Kostas Katsenos presented himself to the authorities at the beginning of the trial, and was held imprisoned for six months before being released.

Revolutionary Struggle members Kostas Gournas, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa were released from prison after 18 months, when the maximum period of pretrial detention expired.

Today, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa are at large (!) and no longer attend the court proceeding.

As we write these lines, the trial is at the stage of defense witnesses’ testimonies. Already, the witnesses in defense of Revolutionary Struggle members K.Gournas, N.Maziotis and P.Roupa gave their statements in court. In particular, comrades from Greece and abroad argued the significance of the Revolutionary Struggle group in political and historical terms, and defended armed struggle as well as the entirety and breadth of revolutionary ventures. In the upcoming days, the court will hear witnesses’ testimonies for the defense of V.Stathopoulos, K.Katsenos, S.Nikitopoulos, Ch.Kortesis and M.Beraha, who deny their participation in the organization, nevertheless demonstrate the importance of struggle and the need to resist.

During the days of this international appeal, in late November, it is estimated that the trial will likely be nearing the defendants’ statements. It is thus considered as very important to receive messages of solidarity and resistance from comrades all over the world, who can show in their own way that the accused comrades are not alone, that the struggle for the overthrow of this world is always timely.

– ASSEMBLY FOR THE REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE CASE (Athens)

International Conspiracy for Revenge – FAI/IRF takes responsibility for arson of a school in Manado (Indonesia)

School burns during the week of solidarity action for Eat and Billy, called by the International Conspiracy for Revenge.

325 receives and transmits:

On 11 of November 2012, covered by the night and with desires of revolutionary solidarity to the imprisoned anarchists from around the world, we burnt one state elementary school in Paniki, Manado. We salute our action to all of our brothers and sisters from Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front (FAI – IRF).

Maybe, many of the comrades will be asking why we put a fire in a school? It’s a simple answer.

First, school is a prison. And there’s no other excuse to defend the school and write it out from the list of targets of revolutionary actions. In school, we can’t learn about freedom, bravery, uniqueness and revolutionary solidarity. We learn nothing but the situation of society that imposes on our dignity as a human being.

We dedicated our action to remember our brothers, Eat and Billy who are still jailed by the state. Also, through this action we want to send our revolutionary greetings to Nicola Gai and Alfredo Cospito, members of Conspiracy of Cells of Fire, Theofilos Mavropoulos, Gabriel Pombo da Silva, Marco Camenisch, members of Revolutionary Struggle and the
imprisoned anarchist in Chile and Bolivia. To Luciano Tortuga and Mario Tripa Lopez, we send you revolutionary hugs to both of you.

This action is part of our issue of Direct Action for one week to remember our brothers who are imprisoned by the state, the struggle against state, capital and society.

Never step back,
Never unarmed,
Never bow,

For anarchy
For the black international

International Conspiracy for Revenge (ICR)
Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front (FAI – IRF)

–

Notes on the action:

The fire started at around 9pm. The entire school was burned out. 322 children now have a lot of free time without state education. There was not a single casualty. Following the previous ICR action in Manado on 5th November, the police organised a meeting specifically to discuss the situation, where media were not allowed inside to hear the proceedings. They are presumed to have decided on a policy of denial, to attempt to suppress the information about the attacks. Hence, the previous explosive device in Manado was declared only to be an “empty suitcase” mistaken for a bomb, and the arson of this school declared as an “electrical short-circuit”.

(Mainstream media)

International Conspiracy for Revenge – FAI/IRF claim bombing and call for global actions in solidarity with prisoners of FAI-Indonesia Eat & Billy

325 receives and transmits:

“Remember, remember
The fifth of November
The gunpowder treason and plot.
I know of no reason
Why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.”
(V for Vendetta)

Last night (Monday, 5 November 2012), we placed a small explosive package.
We put it in front of Red Monkey Karaoke’s pub in Manado. We did it as a small gesture of a solidarity to all the rebels in Papua who were shot by the Indonesian military, to the people in Philippines who stand up against the eco-disaster of mega project of SMI-Xstrata, to the rebels in Greece squats who faced the eviction and were kidnapped by the state, to the anti-fascist fighters around the world who stand up against discrimination and terror.

We know it means nothing for some people who can only throw us by critiques and on other side, put their self behind the bars of reasons. For some people, this kind of solidarity “isn’t the true solidarity” because we hide our face and only put one name: Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front. Even so, we still don’t want to send our solidarity to “some revolutionary”, on the contrary we declare ourselves as a nihilist front.

But, we still want to mention our brothers in arms who always light a fire in our hearts by sending us their message: never step back, never bow, never unarmed, Conspiracy of Cells of Fire and anarchist revolutionary Theofilos Mavropoulos, to the revolutionary prisoners in Greece, to Gabriel Pombo da Silva, to Luciano Tortuga Pitronello and Mario Tripa Lopez, to Alfredo Cospito and Nicola Gai who are kidnapped by the state, to the anarchist prisoners of operation Ardire, Mangiafuoco, Ixodidae and Thor, to the brave one Henry Zeggarundo, to Marcelo, Juan and Fredy, to both Ivan Silva and Carla Verdugo, and last but not the least: our two brothers in struggle who are still seized by the state, members of FAI Indonesia section: Eat and Billy, and Tukijo: you are also our brother.

Our action tonight is a part of an international call of general strike and international solidarity to all the fighters who rise against domination, control, power and eco-destruction.

Our action totally echoes the call from our brothers of Revolutionary Groups for the Dispersion of Terror and the Fires On The Horizon from Greece, the Insurrectional Cell Mariano Sanchez Añon (CI-MSA) from Mexico, the Wolfpack in Russia, and the Cholera Cell as well as the Cell of Conspirators for the Extension of Chaos in Buenos Aires.

Never step back,
Never unarmed,
Never bow,
Solidarity in action, always

International Conspiracy for Revenge
Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front
–

Notes on the action:

Red Monkey Karaoke is one of the high class entertainment places in Manado. The device was placed in the parking area, in the middle of many cars from rich people. The target: cars in the parking area. Destroy the cars (as a main transportation for urban people). This is a symbol that ICR – FAI/IRF stand next to the rebels who are against the eco-disaster. To show solidarity and never step back from the frontline.

Red Monkey Karaoke is located in the main street of Manado. Pierre Tendean street is the widest and main street in Manado. Red Monkey was chosen because it is one of the consumerist symbols of Manado. The targeted was not the people, and that’s why the package was placed in the parking area.

–

The device was discovered by Megamass corporate security at 24:00 hrs. The security alerted Manado police who secured the area. At 02:00 Sulawesi police force arrived, made their evaluation and at 02:32 the item was detonated.

=======================================================

Dear comrades and companerxs of Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front (FAI – IRF) from around the world, to all the rebels who still rise against the power, society and eco-disaster.

We, the International Conspiracy for Revenge, Indonesian section of FAI-IRF want to make an international call of direct action against all property and symbols of society, eco-destroyers, fascists, military and our enemies. This international call in the beginning is to remember the abduction of our two brothers from Long Live Luciano Tortuga Cell – FAI Indonesia, Eat and Billy, by the state one year ago. One year of kidnap and harassment of revolutionary action done by our brothers. And not to forget to mention, the fugitive member of Long Live Luciano Tortuga Cell, K, who is still underground and hunted by power.

But in essence, our action will be dedicated to all the rebels and revolutionaries who never step back, eating their words, and who never want to wash their hands by the sale of another revolutionary name to protect their comfort zones.

We want to call our sisters and brothers in arms from all the cells of FAI-IRF to refresh our revolutionary memories. That until today, we haven’t forgotten and will never forget our sisters and brothers who are kidnapped and seized behind bars by the state. Eat and Billy are only a small piece in a wave of repression that always faced the rise of insurrectionary desires around the circles of FAI-IRF. Action always speaks louder than words.

For one week, starting from today, we want to send our revolutionary greetings for Eat and Billy and other rebels (proud and revolutionary members of CCF and Revolutionary Struggle, Luciano Tortuga Pitronello, Mario Tripa Lopez, Marco Camenisch, Gabriel Pombo da Silva, Theofilos Mavropoulos, Alfredo Cospito and Nicola Gai, Marcelo, Juan and Fredy, Ivan Silva and Carla Verdugo, anarchist prisoners of operations in Italia and many more revolutionary names) that must be remembered and mentioned in our hearts through action.

See you in the street, covered by the night through the fires against power and society.

For anarchy
For Black International
For our sisters and brothers

International Conspiracy for Revenge
Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front
FAI Indonesian Section

================

Communiques & News from FAI-Indonesia

First release of Black International Editions: “Mapping the Fire”

International Words of Solidarity with the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire (CCF)

From 325:

Update: Statement of the nine members of the R.O. Conspiracy of-Cells of Fire and Theofilos Mavropoulos in the first session of the new CCF case trial

PDF: English & Spanish versions (Click “Save As” to download)

“This pamphlet is a meeting point of comrades from all over the world. An imaginary meeting since the walls and bars of the prisons where we are temporarily keep our bodies hostage. But our meanings remain free, escape from the cells of prison and are expressed with words continuing to provoke authority.

Words that still smell of fire and gunpowder, words which carry with them all of our hate for the system, words unrepentant and armed, words which transfer stresses and desires, words which break the isolation of prison, words full of passion for the mutiny we want to continue, words from Chile, Mexico, America, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Bulgaria, Indonesia…

The letters sent to us by the hostage comrades, replying thus to the international call of solidarity of the CCF is not just mail between prisoners.

Our plan for a Black International of imprisoned anarchists, is not simply “a nice theory” which begins and ends inside printed words. It is the deposit of memory which exists, in a move forward.

A memory which does not always count its moments with common terms and common reference points. By reading this pamphlet someone can discover an international galaxy of points of views and positions with comrades whose references speak of the class war and the proletariat and others who speak of nihilism and anti-socialism.

This difference for us is not a contradiction. On the contrary it reveals the invisible line which connects all forms of anarchy and dispute into an international revolutionary front which has as its aim to destroy every form of authority.” Conspiracy of Cells of Fire : Imprisoned Members Cell (Excerpt from the Introduction)

Today in Greece, October 8th, a trial for the case of the Revolutionary Organisation – Conspiracy of Cells of Fire will take place in a specially converted room in the female prisons of Korydallos prisons. The trial concerns the arrests in Volos and the arrests on December 4th, the sending of the 14 incendiary anti-system parcels and the clash in Pefki, 17 comrades are on trial. There will be a solidarity demonstration at the courthouse of the female prisons of Korydallos on this day at 9am.

This publication, the first from Black International Editions, is released online and in paper format from three countries – Greece, Chile and United Kingdom, as an act of solidarity and confrontation to this court process against the CCF and their co-accused. The words of the anarchist prisoners who have responded to the international solidarity call of the CCF meet with the statements of the groups of the international network for counter-information and translation. Together with the armed words of the CCF, a new international revolutionary front is drawn out, this new publication maps the fire that has been spreading across oceans into many territories. In the words of Eat, imprisoned member of Long-Live Luciano Tortuga Cell, FAI Indonesia:

“We are the new chaotic virus, the ghost of freedom, the uncontrollable international plague of revolt.”

For Greek language version, you can find this publication on paper at various self-organised spaces in Exarchia, Athens, Greece, or email sal.spf(at)gmail.com for copies.

In Santiago, Chile, find it at Biblioteca La Hiedra or via Entropia Ediciones in a Spanish language version.

In UK, find it at anarchist spaces, like Kebele in Bristol, or 56a Infoshop in London. You can also find it at the 2012 London Anarchist Bookfair where Elephant Editions will have copies – elephanteditions(at)riseup.net

The email for contact with the imprisoned CCF members has moved to riseup.net’s mail server. From now on, you can communicate at sinomosiapf(at)riseup.net

For the destruction of the existent…

Spectacle of police terrorism against the R.O. Conspiracy of Cells of Fire and Theofilos Mavropoulos at Evelpidon courts

A communiqué by all of the imprisoned comrades themselves

From Contra Info:

The trial against the imprisoned CCF members and anarchist Theofilos Mavropoulos was scheduled for the morning of June 27th at Evelpidon courts, in Athens. In addition to much heavier charges, all ten of them are now prosecuted even for incitement to criminal acts in relation to three texts that had been published online in October–November 2011. The first one was a solidarity text to the anarchist hangout Nadir (in Thessaloniki) and the second one concerned the preliminary investigation due to the text in solidarity with Nadir, both signed by the imprisoned members of the R.O. CCF and Theofilos Mavropoulos. On June 26th, one day before the trial at Evelpidon courts, a solidarity statement concerning this new prosecution against CCF members and Theofilos Mavropoulos was issued by the anarchist hangout Nadir.*

The third among the aforementioned texts that has also been included in the trial brief is not even their own, but it is a responsibility claim for incendiary attack on Studio ATA in Melissia, Athens, signed by the Deviant Behaviours for the Spreading of Revolutionary Terrorism/International Revolutionary Front (the same group that on June 29th, 2012, claimed responsibility for the explosive attack on the Greek headquarters of Microsoft in Maroussi, Athens, an action which was carried out in the early hours of Wednesday, June 27th).

That Wednesday morning, 27/6, a spectacular terror-show was set up by the agents of “citizen protection”. By 8.30am, dark-blue luxury jeeps and blue paddy-wagons of the special terror-unit set off from Koridallos prisons and crossed the city’s streets at high speeds, with flashing sirens wailing like crazy.

Eight of the imprisoned comrades attended the proceeding at Evelpidon courts, while two of them were absent (for non-alarming reasons). Among them was comrade Olga Ekonomidou, who looked well —she had finally come out of the solitary confinement of Diavata prisons and is expected to be transferred to Eleonas–Thebes prisons, given there will be no “unpleasant surprise” on the part of prison authorities.

A small-scale scuffle broke out when the imprisoned comrades were being transferred from the police paddy-wagons into a hellish basement at Building 9, because few thugs from anti-riot squads tried to provoke and push back the gathered people (by that time, nearly over a hundred), and even used police batons against solidaritarians. The incident soon came to an end, with no serious injuries.

The eight prisoners were locked up for approximately five hours in that basement. Numerous random people, and even lawyers passing by, were asking curiously in a whispery voice why were so many repressive forces lined up across the courtyard alleys, evidently terrorized at the sight of not only hooded and fully-armed blue cops but also of a total of five green police squads guarding closely for hours the space between the detention rooms and the solidaritarians.

When the prisoners’ transfer finally began from Building 9 to the courtroom in Building 2, within a distance of nearly 100 metres, it was already expected that the trial would be postponed after the counsel’s respective appeal. Police vehicles were parked close to each other, in order to block any visual contact with the captive comrades. Not more than 80 comrades were present then, what felt at least discouraging, bearing in mind the political importance of this prosecution as an attempted silencing of radical free speech. However, solidarity slogans were chanted lively in the alleys of courtyards, while several of the comrades, friends and relatives managed to accompany the smiling and proud CCF members as well as revolutionary Theofilos Mavropoulos inside the courtroom, who were all handcuffed and “escorted” tightly by “anti”terrorist hooded macho thugs.

Solidarity words included the following slogans: ‘The anarchist discourse cannot be penalized; cops and judges, go fuck yourselves’, ‘Freedom for the Cells of Fire’, ‘Praxis of anarchist is not just words; freedom for the anarchist comrades’, ‘The States are the only terrorists; solidarity with armed guerrillas’, ‘Only bursts of Kalashnikov would do justice and make you [cops] come to your senses’, ‘The passion for freedom is stronger than all prison cells’, ‘Rage and consciousness, denial and violence; down with statism, long live anarchy’…

People who stood outside the courtroom at the time were shouting out loud their solidarity and complicity with the accused, when a police squad passed near them; a cop was particularly irritated at the sound of an anti-Nazi slogan, so much as to raise his middle finger. He got the response he deserved—to put it in his ass, of course—but, other than that, comrades stayed calm, moved closer to the courtyard and focused on greeting with their strength and applauses the anarchist prisoners on their way back to the police vans, after the presiding judge had agreed to the postponement of the trial (set for December 2nd, 2013).

Unlike the conditions at the court-martial of Koridallos women’s prisons, where identity cards of visitors are withheld and returned upon exit from the courtroom, no one must give identity card upon entrance through the metal detectors in Evelpidon courts area. Nevertheless, the day was marked by ambushes of plainclothes cops who conducted identity checks of visitors earlier in the morning, as well as verbal provocations by anti-riot cops against attendees who were walking away from Building 2 after the trial process was over, by midday.

The jeeps and vans of the terror-unit drove off with sirens wailing once again, headed back to Koridallos prisons. After a while, one police battalion harassed two comrades who were leaving the area, asking for their identity cards. A “law enforcement officer” attempted to punch one of them, who was also chased by the murderers in uniform, but quickly got away. The bullying ended only after the squad’s leader ordered his sheep to come back to the herd.

So, this was not just another day at public courts. To try to put it in other words, it was a low turnout of attendees at the umpteenth trial against comrades, a long waiting within the disgusting environment of the temples of bourgeois justice, where court employees were pushing back and forth shopping trolleys (“expropriated” from supermarkets) laden with piles of trial briefs and judicial documents of countless cases against civilians; and it was a harsh reminder of the ongoing captivity of unrepentant revolutionary fighters, in the context of an overt prosecution of freedom of speech and solidarity.

* On July 2nd the anarchist hangout Nadir was raided once again, in the context of an extensive police operation across the city of Thessaloniki.
Here’s the communiqué by the imprisoned members of the R.O. CCF of the first phase and anarchist of praxis Theofilos Mavropoulos concerning the trial farce of June 27th:

[ Tuesday, June 26th, 2012 ]

On June 27th we stand trial charged with incitement to criminal acts in relation to three texts that were released when we found ourselves captives in the State’s prisons. One of these texts is a responsibility claim for arson on vehicle(s) belonging to a television production studio company by the group “Deviant Behaviours…” of the International Revolutionary Front (IRF), and the other two are our own announcements about the cops’ raid in the anarchist hangout Nadir (in Thessaloniki), as well as the interrogation that followed this text…

The phrase in question that annoyed the judicial mafia is “not 1 millimetre back; 9mms in cops’ heads.”

We could have not wasted even a single word about this case. The legal implications of this new prosecution are just a drop in the ocean for us.

We know that we have ahead of us predefined convictions to many decades in prison. How could we be concerned about a few months more, from one misdemeanor charge? But still… an anarchist of praxis cannot think with the legal reasoning of a lawyer.

This prosecution acquires a distinct political value. As already shown, the State, the prosecutorial authorities and police services have repeatedly tried all innovative methods and tactics against the CCF: members of the Conspiracy charged with abetments while being in custody; extension of remand in custody (by an order of new pretrial detention just few hours before the expiry of the 18-month period of the initial pretrial detention) against one of our comrades (Gerasimos Tsakalos) while he was hospitalized as a hunger striker; cooperation of the Italian and Greek authorities for our probable extradition to Italy; further prosecutions in relation to texts, etc.

It is written somewhere that the more your enemy persecutes you, the more it’s proven that you have succeeded hard blows against the enemy.

To us, the charges that fill the thousands of pages of our trial briefs are a title of honour. But we want to stress that, as anarchists of praxis, what we leave behind us unanswered becomes a legacy for the future; to the contrary, what we gain creates our perspective.

The fact that the prison guards can keep for two and a half months comrades locked up in solitary confinement cells, without the aggressive reflexes of anarchist solidarity being activated (with few exceptions), is undoubtedly a defeat.

If the daily attacks by dastard petty fascists and their presence on the street, in the squares and neighbourhoods won’t be met with the corresponding retaliation on our part, with knives, knuckledusters, fires and explosions, then they will mark the retreat of the enemy within.

The recoil of offensive actions from the new anarchist urban guerrilla warfare (with the exception of the anarchists of praxis and the cells of FAI-IRF) against the tension conditions of the social machine is obviously a victory of fear and repression.

We do not want to let fear and defeatism become our shadow. In spite of the times, we remain unrepentantly hardheaded and steadfast. We will not turn down the volume of our discourse or disarm our words.

The fact that we are being accused because of our texts for “inciting others to commit felony offenses” means that our words can still communicate with the doubters and deniers of our era and be transformed into actions. We are proud of it. We never liked hollow words. At the same time we never believed in, nor reconciled with democratic liberties and rights. We have always thought that they serve as a “showcase” for the police state and the social machine.

By the prosecution of our texts, even the last illusions that some people may maintain about democracy are withdrawn. Now the curtain of freedom of speech has been pulled back, and the judicial censorship has been exposed. Yet this is a good thing… Therefore, we will never talk about the “criminalization” of discourse and ideas.

We have always believed that the insurrectionist theory is accompanied by anarchist practices, as well as vice versa.

Logos and praxis (discourse and action) are inseparable concepts. The positive side of our prosecution is polarization. Once illusions are withdrawn from the scene, each and every one takes position. There are no innocents.

We respond to the fear of repression with the momentum of attack. Ignorance and indifference are repealed, and now decisions speak.

The dilemma is clear. Either with the society of the existent or the deniers of our era; either an appeased citizen or oppugning riotmaker; either an eternally indignant protestor or anarchist of praxis; either rule or exception, either now or never.

NOT 1 MILLIMETRE BACK
9MMS AGAINST DIRECTORS AND SERVANTS OF THE SOCIAL MACHINE

PS. In court, where we’re called to appear, we disdain the judicial marionettes and disregard the defense of our rights. After all, we have thrown the rights which democracy “grants” to us into fire long ago, along with our legal identities.

Our presence there and our stance are yet another insult and an affront to the laws’ Inquisitors.

It is a small part of the total anarchist war we declare against society of the State.

The imprisoned members of the R.O. CCF of the first phase and anarchist of praxis Theofilos Mavropoulos

The Abyss Does Not Stop Us

From vivalaanarquia, transl waronsociety:

The abyss does not stop us. Communique at one year after the Bombing that almost cost me my life

First days of June, 2012

To the conscious rebels; to my companions scattered across the world:

A little more than a month has passed since everything changed for me that cold predawn of June 1st last year, and I believe that to not declare myself about it would be to play along with the game that has me here prisoner in the hospital of the Santiago 1 prison, and it would be a dishonor to myself, but above all to you my dear compañerxs who worry about me.

I should say: I wanted to make a balance one year from when all this happened, but did not manifest it publicly for two reasons: the first is because that text was too compromising, and the second and more important in my opinion is because nothing was really analyzed in it, it was only a compilation of frustration, resentment and hatred that raged against everyone, cursing those who ran off, but now I want to do it, I feel the lucidity to be able to deliver some words that I am sure are so deserved.

But before beginning, I want to advise you of the reasons for my delay. The days have not been easy, the permanent confinement has begun to do its work, and my mood has been terrible, which is why my first draft of this communique ended up being a compendium of rage and ire; arrogance, aggressiveness and haughtiness began to flourish in my attitudes, and faced with some situations I simply did not recognize myself, but I fight, I fight to continue forward and not betray myself, trying to fight my own self in daily life, reminding myself and not forgetting who I am and why I am here.

Well here I go…

As concerns my wounds and healing it has gone very well, the daily exercises and practice in the manual labor of life have been done, I say this with a great smile, that I have surpassed the disability of knowing myself semi-mutilated; as for my vision it has improved greatly, but I should continue with the ocular treatment for a good time; as for the burns, apart from being all healed many have evolved positively, even so, I should keep using the special compression suit for the burns and the rose hip oil. At least for me, this chapter that has to do with my physical state is closed, happily the bomb did not kill me.

My emotional state has been weakening over the past days, but this is due to the permanent confinement, I know that all prisoners have our highs and lows, so I am optimistic about this situation, after all, the confinement cannot be forever, and if it was then they would only have my flesh, because my mind and spirit will carry on in the street next to each combatant, smiling and conspiring, and I say this not as a poetic slogan I affirm it as a reality that is reflected in the projection of insurgent dreaming where the authoritarian values of domination are crushed in various ways.

Prison is hard, I will not deny it, but it is possible to confront it, and we are witnesses of that, myself and each and every one of my companions who have in different ways embraced me to make me know that I am not alone. The exemplary punishment that power boasts so much about is nothing of the sort, at least in my case, since my comrades as well as myself do not have a clue why their media-spectacle is realized successfully, and what’s more, the only example we follow here is the one we give ourselves, wielding our best weapon: solidarity.

Self-critiques I make many, above all in this episode that is called prison, where I have taken out the worst of myself, for which I humbly beg the pardon of each and every one of the comrades who I have shown my teeth to in one way or another, those I have attacked only for the desire to unload my anger, those I did not want to see/write due to the rage and envy that my condition created in me, and above all, I beg the pardon of everyone who has had to swallow bad faces, disagreeable times and my poor character for the sole fact of wanting to be in solidarity with me. So as I ought to confess I have not been at the height of the circumstances, of your solidarity which is enormous, but here we are ready to move forward, to fall and to get back up again, to learn from the errors — this is the idea, right?

If I am to make a constructive criticism it would be only that perhaps there is a lack of first-hand information about what it is to live the consequences of choosing a rebel life, what it means to live in prison and isolation, what this brings with it, understanding more closely the stigma of being considered a terrorist and what goes on with our lives when this happens, familiarizing ourselves more with subjects like clandestinity and exile that are recurrent places in the struggle for freedom in a way that is more real and less imaginary, and finally starting to speak more about torture, the methods the enemy applies, crime as base value for a State-police, mutilation as a possibility in the war against authority, pain and agony as part of the life of warriors, and thus each and every one of these difficult possibilities that one can face, beyond speculation and charlatanry.

If I am to share my scant, but no less intense, experience in this sense, I would say that the work of prison and isolation have to do more than anything with a moral demotivation, the others start not to matter a bit, likewise what is happening outside, you adhere yourself to the prison reality, this is your world now, what do you get from knowing about what is happening outside if you are inside? You start to worry always less about yourself, you do not care about anything, you become contemptuous of others and the environment, you begin to value others’ efforts to get a smile out of you less and less, because they are not living your nightmare, it follows that you lose the fear of anything because you know that you have lost everything and you are at the bottom of the abyss, you have fucked life, you turn hostile and aggressive, seeking in this way to end everything soon, that the jailers crush you with their batons for the insults you hurl at them every day, and that, if you are lucky, they’ll give you a hand and you’ll end up dead, to finally rest from the psychosis you are carrying or, in the worst case, that other prisoners do this task to show you who has the most balls. When the psychosis of confinement advances, gestures of solidarity begin to matter little, you put to yourself emotional traps like “Why see importance in a gesture of solidarity if I remain prisoner?” or even worse, you articulate phrases like,”They are not suffering the consequences like I am,” and you curse your luck; but some hard loving and caring slaps are needed to warn us of the toxicity of these thoughts, that is to say, it is really stupid to believe that only we live the consequences of confinement, and it is not that one wants for everyone to live these consequences, but the sense of not being alone and helpless makes us strong, therefore, when a comrade falls prisoner it doesn’t just have to do with their confinement/punishment, there are many noble hearts who decide to accompany the comrade in this new situation, acting in solidarity with him/her, being present, writing, spreading news of their situation, vindicating them in the street, with flyers, pamphlets, posters, shouting their name in the demonstration, breaking the symbols of power in their honor, etc. Prison and isolation do their work, you start to dig your own grave and alone you go deeper into it, until you end up hearing phrases so absurd as that you are alone, and the worst of this self-imposed trap is that we ourselves take care of driving off the tools that can help us to not decline, and then, sickly, we complain and get depressed from the forgetfulness we have buried ourselves in, because by now no one remembers us, no one is in solidarity with us, the desperation eats us up inside, and what we think would be our greatest weapon to confront adversity was crushed by the walls of silence, our will shattered, and so your projects become of little relevance, you get discouraged easily, the future becomes uncertain, you start to lose interest in life, and one anguishing night you end up hanging yourself in your cell.

So in order to not fall into these kinds of dynamics it is important to observe oneself constantly and to be evaluating ourselves, clinging to the things/people/circumstances that make us well, and distancing ourselves from the harmful (as much as possible), because certainly to reach a state of carceral psychosis is not a matter of one day or another, it is a monster that goes on growing in of our minds and hearts with the passing of times, and it is effectively a gradual process that we can become aware of and combat before it is too late.

I should say that nobody ever told me what permanent confinement meant (much less how to confront it), my most real encounters were the anecdotes of one book or another, and the rest was experienced through my imagination, with this, I am never saying that today I was not ready to assume the costs of the postures I had chosen in life, but it definitely would have been a great help to me. Fine, but at least in my case I have tried to face this arming myself with projects to contribute to, even from my condition, it is important to find sense in your days, they can be simple things, reading a book and giving your opinion, writing with others who are imprisoned or not, creating music/poetry, learning to draw, exercising your body, etc; but here I make an note, our most important projects, at least in permanent confinement, should be those that are needed only from our readiness and will, and therefore, I do not foreclose on the possibility of contributing in projects that are beyond our physical limitations, but one must keep in consideration that these can bring oceans of frustrations with them: someone doesn’t come to visit, does not write me back, forgets to bring this or that, that we organize ourselves around certain themes, and if our senses of life are limited in turn to just projects in the street, with a few trip-ups of this kind we will be taken down in terms of morale more or less quickly; therefore I believe that one must maintain two kinds of projects, one that makes us maintain contact with the other side of the wall, and the other that must do more than anything with an individual labor, that can generate itself even in conditions of maximum confinement, something that happens in unfortunate cases, be it loss of communication with the outside, or the seizure only of the material we use for our individual projects, so we do not decline in morale. It is important to create support networks for oneself in order to not crumble along the way, to be observant and analyze what the prison reality offers you and to take from it what you deem convenient, which is to say that if the prison keeps you in total isolation you can take advantage of the silence of this situation to read, write or reflect, alternatively if it offers you the courtyard you can take advantage of it to exercise or talk with other prisoners (one can always learn something useful), and thus in a substantial way the possibility of elaborating an escape plan or a mutiny always exists independently of the regimen they submit us to.

If I am to speak about another one of the possible consequences of this war that some fill their mouths with so much, it would be to say that to be recognized as an enemy of authority is not easy, less so when you are labeled as a terrorist in the media, your social environment is affected almost unanimously, family members, friends and comrades take off running, turn their backs on you and often deny they ever knew you, few are the brave who dare to remain with you, the public opinion does its work and through all the possible methods the system tries to isolate you, they don’t have to get their hands dirty with the death penalty anymore, these days the methods are more sophisticated and democratic, they make your life cease to have meaning because they distance you from everything that you are a part of, and they don’t just do this physically by getting you in a cage, but also psychologically to reduce your convictions, they demonize you collectively, they erase the memory of what you once were and they transform you into a television case, in a failed explosive attack, in a bank robbery with a policeman killed, or into a member of a phantasmic terrorist organization, you are that, you are your letter of presentation, to such an extent that if you don’t become aware that you are much more than what the press says, you end up believing it; and the best example can be given by Mauri–why is he known for an unsuccessful May 22 and has anyone ever heard of the times when he helped some elderly people in his neighborhood with their heavy shopping bags? We ourselves are responsible for reducing him to a date on the calendar. Society strikes you psychically, your days no longer have the sense they did before, you are worth nothing and you have ruining the lives of everyone around you — Why keep existing? Why cause more pain? They no longer need to stain their hands with your blood; please, we are civilized people, instead they incite you to finish yourself off, because they have reduced you to a mere episode, you are that, a terrorist who only knows how to create pain around him, and so the best thing you can do is to do your loved ones a favor, that is if you still have anything of a heart left, and end your life. This is the hidden discourse that reproduces our shiny Chilean democracy, there are no longer any revolutionaries, now they minimize us as mere terrorists, because clearly a revolutionary is someone with feelings, with ideas, love of freedom and a companion of the oppressed, that is, someone worth imitating, instead the terrorist is a shadow with impunity who has no heart and is obsessed with the use of violence due to past childhood traumas — so how to face this situation?

For my part I have learned to keep public opinion at bay, which is usually the opinion of the bourgeois press, with the simple act of analyzing their role one manages to halt much of their discourse, although I will not deny that many times in their work they have hurt me deeply, above all when you become aware of these opinions coming from the mouths of people you love, when they are the ones who put you between the spade and the wall: either kill yourself or keep hurting us, wow, how difficult, how intense, then it is your turn to decide, you or they, you or those you love most, and if you choose yourself what sense will life have without them? Will you choose yourself? Do you love them so little? You? Them? The instinct of survival or your love? Which is stronger? Apparently neither is the correct alternative, but I choose my life, if I do not love myself, it is impossible for me to love others. And I end up expelling various persons from my life and from my heart for always, I keep going, alone and wounded like that predawn, confused, with death stalking me and red in flames of ire, life hit me again, but it is only another chapter and I get up again, this time with the help of what was never missing: solidarity. Now I reflect on it, one year after the bombing that almost cost me my life, and I do not repent these decisions, the pain was better, like the bomb, it was momentary, but life continued and the suffering of these episodes went diffused with the passing of time, life continues, struggle continues, and what is insurmountable today will tomorrow be nothing more than a story, another chapter in this existence of combat.

At this point I have spoken of two possible consequences in revolutionary struggle, prison and being recognized as an enemy of society, but I have not spoken of the consequence that is most noted in my case, the mutilation of our bodies and how we can keep fighting in spite of this. If I am to speak of healing and how the mutilation of our bodies becomes like a cross that one must carry for life, I believe that it is important to point out that each case is particular, having its windows and own difficulties. But I suppose that in the final count there are enough similarities. At first you are discouraged, it is like a cataclysm that dusted your life away and all beautiful feelings find themselves under the rubble of mutilation, desires that what happened to you had only been a bad dream that you will soon wake up from, you become obstinate toward the obvious, this could not have happened to you, there must be an explanation, but the only explanation is the one the mirror gives you, the days pass, you get depressed, you think that you will never get past it, you need to ask for help for some basic tasks and this causes you an uncomfortable humiliation, you become hateful and this new situation frustrates you, the people who try to encourage you notice your resignation, life like this does not make sense, but they apply themselves to support you in spite of your mood, you are irritated, you don’t want to do exercises or rehabilitate yourself, you want to send everything to the shit, take your life away, this seems to be an option, but you are afraid that in the attempt you will end up worse off, you are confused, you cry in the nights of solitude and you make yourself like a wild beast in front of others, you are wounded you know, but you have to heal your heart to be able to start to recover. If you manage to make it this far, you have taken a step forward in the path toward victory, your victory, because this is a battle, now you should arm yourself with patience, frustration is just around the corner, one, two, three, one hundred falls, nobody said it would be easy, but look at yourself, you don’t do it very well, but you do it, and alone, without help, a pat on the back, the rest is practice they tell you, if you could do it once, you can do it again, you look around you, physically you are alone, and you accomplish it: you smile. How long has it been since you smiled? You don’t need to show it to anyone, you have shown it to yourself, you are a warrior giving one of your best fights, you resign yourself not to die, this is for the brave, a few more stumbles, ridicule from the usual suspects, reality takes care of putting you on the uphill, you lay it on yourself, it is difficult, but you already did not renounce yourself, that is a fact, you look back, you’ve come a long way to collapse here, now you have reasons to continue, you cannot fail all of them, the who you love and who want to see you happy, but above all, you cannot fail yourself, you told yourself this once when things were difficult, you are a warrior for life, and you clench your teeth against the shame, sometimes you say horrible things, you are implacable in front of yourself, other times you feel the proudest in the world, you did not fall in spite of everything, the days move forward, you start to take in the ritual of all this, you no longer turn sour before your reflection, you begin to accept it, you learn things that are new for this context, but not so new for life itself, you relearn to learn, things now are seen in a different nuance and one afternoon with the sun still as company you set the ultimatum, if I do not remake my life by this date then I will not go on with this madness…

Finally you persist, you manage to get past it, that date arrives when you have to make the evaluation of your performance and the smile on your face reveals that you have passed the text with success and excellence, then you do not feel disabled nor incapacitated, nor anything, you are another warrior, ready to face anything.

As for what concerns my case in particular, I suppose that what happened to me was what happens in the majority of serious accidents, I wanted to seek a rapid and simple solution (death), but some provoked me, some very rudely, at least they tried to, and so, clinging to solidarity I kept on until the recovery began to give its first results, now with this background I got it into my head that I could get myself up out of this fall, I remember that the stubbornness and obstinacy played much in my favor, since there were people who did not give a shit about my recovery (including medical specialists), but in the end I would make the best judgment myself, it would only a question of time, I also remember that I went through many embarrassments that I would prefer not to disclose hahaha, and these happened because I went against time in my recovery, I tried to do/practice everything, even without having rehearsed things, and I say that I went against time because I wanted to go into the prison as recovered as possible, I did not want to even think of a prison guard assisting me, I luckily that never happened. After going into the prison on November 22 with a tight stomach and high morale, I prepared to take advantage of this new situation of total confinement to finish with rehabilitating completely, and there was no lack of times when they ridiculed me for my physical condition, but in the face of these situations I bit my tongue and thought that sooner or later they would regret their jokes, because I knew better than anyone that they were spitting at the sky, soon I would be totally recovered and they would not dare to speak to me that way; the time passed, I took my time, I went as slow as a turtle, I exercised every day without a break, whether it was cold or hot, I was disciplined with myself, and it was a question of practice, patience and perseverance (the 3 “P”s like I told you) to find myself totally recovered, and well, here I am, look at me one year after the bombing that almost killed me. Who said that I would bite the mud of humiliation forever? Who said that I would be defeated for the rest of my life? Who said that the struggle does not make us great? If my ideas can bring me to lose my life, they can also bring me to recover it, that was always my gamble, and so I have thrown myself with all my strength into the fight, because I recognize in it the greatness to break the chains, and it is a matter of observing me in the everyday to confirm this assertion, if with telling you that I can even thread a needle, like this, as I am, with 8 of the 10 fingers of my hands, I can tie my shoelaces, cook, wash, make nice origami cubes and if it pleases me I can even carry out all the tasks that I did before, clearly, the only small difference is that it takes me a little longer, but that is such a small detail, so insignificant if you compare with how close I was to death, with what passed over, because after everything I always knew it, for revolutionaries impossibilities do not exist, and my splendid recovery is proof of that.

What matters is to never lose the spirit of struggle, not ever, it does not matter how terrible things look, but while your mind and your heart do not betray you the rest becomes mere detail, our bodies can weaken, it is true, but what makes us great has nothing to do with flesh and bones, what turns us into giants are our convictions, our spirit of knowing that we do what is correct.

Now, I write these lines not only to warn of the awful consequences that revolutionary struggle can bring with it, I also do it to contribute in the creation of new and not so new methods for confronting the difficult journeys that we can carry our decisions along. And And it is that on this occasion I can contribute with some examples, through which I encourage other comrades to share their experiences, since the possibilities of struggle are infinite, madness, rape, exile, mutilation, victory, torture, clandestinity, laughter, imprisonment, pain, betrayal, amnesia, dependency, beatings, humiliation, death, all of these, none, others, and so many more, and how many of the warriors in the street today who fight against power and its designs know this? That is, how prepared are we to assume the costs of the social war if we do not know these kinds of things? Can we speak of not repenting without having all this in consideration? Do we understand the significance of prison? What it brings with it? Or do we comprehend what it carries when a comrade is mad? How far do we understand the consequences of declaring ourselves enemies of the State/Capital?

In a struggle against the system in its totality, we have everything to lose, and do we accept these conditions before we embark on the search for our dreams? I am of the idea of knowing what one is involved in, so as to also know to abide by the consequences, assuming them and coming out gracefully through them, because otherwise what happens is what a dear and close compañera warned of: we turn ourselves into the worst propaganda of struggle.

If we think carefully, it should not surprise us that many comrades of before have chosen self-exile as a response to some of these consequences, and it really very difficult to continue the fight in an area where through the media and socially the system cries for your annihilation, in the end how can one confront the system when it is obsessed with confronting you, having you individualized, located and pointed out? Now, I believe that if it is indeed true that the exile of before served to hide behind the comfort of a normal life, far from the criminalization of revolutionary ideas, today, and with the validity of the proposal of the comrades of the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire, of arming an International Revolutionary Front, it remains clear that it does not matter whether we find ourselves prisoners, exiles in another region, or clandestine on another continent, the struggle is only one and it surpasses the barriers of nations and borders, because independently of the language we speak or the idiosyncrasies that differentiate us, the struggle continues to be against structures of power, against the values of authority and against the logic of exploitation and domination, bonding us in this way with each and every one of the warriors who fight for the same objective as ourselves: freedom. I recognize myself in the internationalist struggle, since I know first-hand its excellent results, which is why I take advantage of this instance to unite myself to the proposal of the comrades in Greece, embracing the initiative of the FAI/FRI as a project that appeals to the same criteria as I, hoping that this communique can be a true and real contribution, above all for the comrades who live in situations similar to mine and/or to those who in an unwanted future will have to pass through this.

If I am to make a balance of all this, one year after the bombing that almost cost me my life, my result is positive, very positive, and I will not deny that things were difficult, because there were days dark as the depths of the sea, when everything was crumbling around me, my life as I had constructed it went to shit, but this helped me, with the pain caused, to learn that all this I had built I had not made sufficiently solidly as to endure the praxis of my discourse, if family, friends, comrades and lovers took off flying away from my side, to speak much more profoundly than just physically, to see myself in this situation where many thought that it would be better for me to just sink alone before I would take more people down with me, since they believe that I would never get back up from this, if all these people underestimated me because in their smallness they thought that they themselves wouldn’t be able to stand such a fall as mine, today they are not at my side, it is only for their mediocrity, because know this: I do not lack the affection to forgive them, after everything, not one of us was prepared for this. But for all the rudeness of my words and life, there was no lack of gestures of love and absolute dedication, making me know that in spite of everything they were with me, in the good and in the bad, until the end, reaffirming bonds already forged, perhaps only with incredulous gazes of companionship, with one or another conversation walking around the block, sharing a snack or fraternally criticizing each other on the bench of a plaza.

Power wanted me out of the fight, they wanted to suspend me eternally in June 1st 2011, and they even try to do it today, it is something to observe why I am known and where I find myself, but for me none of this is over, I will continue, I will get up, I will show my claws again and I will keep fighting, confronting the enemy constantly, as in my best times, because I am not a warrior who must be remembered with longing, I am another companion, another one of the pack, only in the bowels of the prison beast, all that differentiates me from the companions in the street is the situation that we face, but if you are able to risk your freedom and even life in the struggle that bonds us, why should it be different for me? One year after the failed attack on the Santander bank branch, I have raised myself with ferocity, I won, even though I sit on the bench of the accused, because I knew to take the reigns of my life with my own hands, I triumphed in the face of the life of commerce that they want to impose on us and in the face of death as the only exit, but this victory is not only mine, what arrogance it would be on my part to believe so, because if it were not for the bold comrades who dared to send me their encouragement and care, know this for certain that today I would not be writing these lines, and so, we, the combatants of the new urban guerrilla, are their defeat.

To all those beautiful people who understand that the social war is much more than bombs, bullets and benzine, and who know that solidarity is much more than a hobby to invest your free time in, to all those who cannot pacify their dreaming while they know that one of their own is suffering, to those who if they did not have the free time kept looking for it, skipping work or class because they know that it depended on them to raise a comrade’s morale, to all those who took on the fun and exciting adventure of conquering freedom, to the comrades of the FAI/FRI, to my dear friend Reyhard Rumbayan (Eat), who with his noble gestures has brought me strength when I was weak, to all those absolved of the bombs case frame-up, whose freedom meant a smile for me when it seemed it would be a torment, to the comrades of the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire, who with their dignity motivate me to continue fighting, to Gabriel Pombo da Silva, Marco Camenisch, and to all the comrades investigated and arrested in the repressive raid against the anarchist movement in Italy, to Mauri who taught me that a wolf clenches his jaw even after death, to the autonomous collectives who attack with decisiveness, to the companions who are clandestine, exiled or hostage, to the brave solidarians, to the conscious rebels, to all of you I dedicate these lines, I send you a warm embrace and I owe you the determination of keeping me alive, because you have to know, you were oxygen when there was none.

Because when you shouted “strength compañero“ I felt stronger than ever! Because neither prison nor agony nor death will detain us! Long live the International Revolutionary Front! Long live the Informal Anarchist Federation! Death to the State! The struggle continues! Toward victory, always!

Luciano Pitronello Sch. Insurrectionalist Political Prisoner.

International Call For Libratory Earth Violence

June 11th Communiqué: Washington Loggers’ Association Building Wrecked

On the night of June 11th in the sleepy town of Olympia, WA, we laid waste to the Washington State Loggers’ Association building, breaking out all 24 of their windows and leaving the painted message “YOU ARE NEVER SAFE. GO LOG IN HELL (A).”

Roughly a decade after the fervent period of Earth Liberation activity that occurred in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, we find ourselves in a far more hopeless situation, immersed in an ever-deepening desert.

Some cling to the idea of hope and others view this as nothing more than a deceitful delusion. Neither narrative concerns us. What truly concerns us is that the living world around us is dying, and that the strength of our heart atrophies through inaction.

How many of us feel disgust being embedded in a concrete jungle, a suburban wasteland, an ocean of meaninglessness?

How many of us mourn the yawning devastation of a clearcut?

While smashing out two dozen windows was only a humble act of revenge in the face of the wholesale destruction of wild life, comrades, let us cease to be eaten up inside by our unactualized rage!

This is an international call to wage war on all those who profit from the rape of the earth.

We greatly embrace and encourage those whose seeds of ferocious intentions have lain dormant thus far to burst forth and raze the cities to the ground. Those cities depend on an empire, a civilization that depends on the ensnarement and suppression of a wild world of meaning and beauty.

“For every action there is a reaction. So as civilization abuses and mistreats fire, fire will abuse civilization. Throughout modern history cities have burned – Rome burned. The civilized order will come to know the true purifying power of fire soon enough. Like wildfires whipping through forests clearing out all the dead wood, making room for new growth to emerge. Civilization will perish in a firestorm, clearing the way for like to sprout and grow unmolested.”

This was done in solidarity with Marie Mason and Eric McDavid, Luciano “Tortuga,” the Kimki Forest Defenders, all ELF and ALF prisoners and fighters, the Individuals Tending Towards the Wild, the still imprisoned Ted Kaczynski (Unabomber), and all those who acted in vengeance, in defiance, and who got away.

May you forever run free.

FOR THE TERRIFYING FREEDOM!
LONG LIVE ALL EARTH WARRIORS!

(More June 11th Solidarity Actions)

Breaking the silence surrounding the case of the anarchist Revolutionary Organization Conspiracy Cells of Fire

From Act for Freedom Now!

Starting with September 2009 and the arrests in Halandri, now 9 members of the R.O. CCF are locked up in prisons around Greece while other comrades are dragged by the anti-terrorist force and the judges, from dungeon to dungeon convicted or detained for the same case.

The attitude of the 9 members of the R.O. CCF from the first moment of their arrest, their claim of political responsibility, their decent attitude inside the prisons and their attempt to leave empty cells behind them feeds our need to stand in solidarity with our imprisoned comrades more than ever.

The “fast track” court martial taking place in the female prisons of Koridallos, all that will come and the pilot scheme moves that are trying to be applied for the first time on them (prosecution for the solidarity text written by the R.O. CCF and anarchist Theofilos Mavropoulos for the anarchist ‘steki’ Nadir) will find us next to our comrades and against any authority.

In such a climate, we cannot remain apathetic, and abandon our comrades at the mercy of state objectives and practices. We unite our intention, proceeding to the development of actions of solidarity to the persecuted comrades, not leaving out of the fire line the authoritarian impose and stressing with every opportunity the necessity for the increase of polymorphic refusals against the authoritarian system.

We deny the role of the victim and of course that of the “defeated from the start” because of the oppression unleashed by the state on the anarchist movement the last two years. The presence of the anti-authoritarian movement must become more obvious than ever. Demonstrations, flyposting, chants on the streets, clashes, occupations, and attacks comprise its polymorphy. Solidarity towards the imprisoned comrades who are persecuted for their subversive action or for their political identity was and is one of our priorities. Because… whoever forgets the hostages of the war, forgets the war itself. We factually show our solidarity denying the logics of selective solidarity and divisions. We unite our forces creating a powerful dyke to the generalized state oppression. And there is no better way available for the step over than to act, to show with our moves that we realize the matter of solidarity.

We took therefore the initiative to call an open discussion for the creation of an Assembly for Solidarity to the R.O. CCF, as well as all the comrades who are persecuted for the same case. Through this we would like to send a signal of solidarity to all comrades who are in the target of the oppression, but also to the organization itself. We desire the better coordination and the intensification of the action with which we aspire to promote our solidarity for the case we are dealing with.

We address, therefore, within these frames, a public call to whoever comrades desires to coordinate themselves with other comrades in the case of solidarity for the specific matter. Our aim is the active participation in the open procedures of the assembly, contributing in its support and in the further broadening of its dynamic. In the hard times we are going through we owe it to ourselves and our comrades to be as sufficient as possible and sharp against authority and its civilization. We are sure that every move of solidarity strengthens the resistances and the revolutionary conscience both ways, sending the message to the people guards and the juridical mafia, that the imprisoned comrades are not alone. The shouts they yell with courage and insistence, the passion for refusal of authority, are a united voice that upsets the rhythm of normality and subjugation. And will never stop being heard as long as this civilization and all things comprising of it, exists…

CALL – DISCUSSION
FRIDAY 10/2
19.00, POLYTECHNIC

Actforfreedomnow/boubourAs

Strengthening the International Revolutionary Front and the Anarchist Federation – without the Informal?

“…it is important to amplify in practice the concept of direct solidarity, in other words, we consider that we need to extend the unmanageable struggle of the hand of solidarity with our imprisoned comrades, to all the levels of the anti-systemic confrontation. The support to comrades who are persecuted or fugitive is a necessity that requires immediate attention.”

From culmine, translated by war on society:

by Giuseppe Dondoglio Antonlini

A few weeks ago while “surfing” the Web I found a text written by the collective Noticias de la Rebelión as their way of responding to the strong critiques made by the anarchist space as a consequence of the infamous statements that they made about some some comrades, particularly against the compa Gustavo Rodríguez.* In reality, I prefer to “let pass” everything that appears in that text, the only question that concretely called my attention was the reference to the call that they made to “strengthening the IRF and the AF,” [the International Revolutionary Front and the Anarchist Federation – transl] but this last without including the essential (and clarifying) suffix “informal”; and all this in these days when some sectors of the so-called “libertarian movement” in Mexico continue convening for the reforming of the extinct Anarchist Federation of Mexico.

The Informal Anarchist Federation (FAI) is an antagonistic project that was born as a proposal for the coordination of the chaotic attack against the entirety of the established in a concrete way, coming from the Italian comrades, although in its first stage it extended to Spain. The FAI up to now has carried out not only decentralized sabotages, but also has internationally coordinated countless attacks directed against a common target in specific campaigns around timely issues–to cite one example, the campaign against FIES [the special maximum-security units of the prison system of the Spanish State designed to hold anarchists and other uncontrollables – transl].

Currently the cells that make up the FAI have extended beyond the Mediterranean region, not only to other areas in Europe but also to other parts of the world. In Russia, Mexico, Finland, Bolivia, Chile, Indonesia, UK; the cells and nuclei informally coordinated in the FAI have carried out actions responding to the international solidarity campaigns, as per the global action proposed in the three base points contained in the first communique of the Federation.

The proposal elaborated by the imprisoned comrades of war, members of the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire in Greece, arrived, contributing to a major focus in the direction in what our unmanageable solidarity aims at. The focus of this proposal is oriented from the informal anarchist praxis. It does not seek to establish (nor much less strengthen) any centralized and bureaucratic “Federation,” nor anything like that, much less does it pretend any control on the part of those who transmitted that proposal, which in a manner has been well-received by the comrades in affinity around the world.

The organic informal at the global level and the idea of coordination of clear chaotic conception, under which the International Revolutionary Front functions, is very far from the “line” of whatever classic Anarchist Federation, whether on the global or regional level, primarily because the IRF is an anarchist, free and totally autonomous coordination, without an office or bureaucratic center from which to transmit a “line” and dictate directives but rather limits itself to the coordination in the action that it directs against the structures of Power and against the individuals who are at the head of the State/Capital. As such, it never intends to form part of a “federated” organization that operates on a public level and centers its life in the quantitative growth of its “federated bodies.”

On this point, I think much still remains to be defined and even more to theorize on the part of anarchist practice. Likewise, it is important to amplify in practice the concept of direct solidarity, in other words, we consider that we need to extend the unmanageable struggle of the hand of solidarity with our imprisoned comrades, to all the levels of the anti-systemic confrontation. The support to comrades who are persecuted or fugitive is a necessity that requires immediate attention.

The Informal Anarchist Federation (FAI) is a coordination perfectly compatible with the International Revolutionary Front (IRF); these sibling groupings share principles and ends, through which they function harmonically and without the least interference. Nevertheless, affinity groups who do not share the acronyms or base principles of the FAI can freely claim themselves as part of the IRF since the “Front” is not a dependent arm of the FAI.

Nevertheless, the IRF, not being a specific or “formal” organization nor pretending to constitute itself as such, is incompatible with the ideas and the practice that nourish the “classic” Anarchist Federations, namely, those of bureaucratic tendency edified on the basis of the principles of “synthesis” and far from the Informal praxis. To strengthen the IRF does not necessarily mean to directly strengthen the project of the FAI, but to try to strengthen any Anarchist Federation alien to the informal practice, which is a fundamental part of the logic of the IRF (at the international level), is an opportunist aberration.

Therefore, it’s hard for me understand to what Anarchist Federation they reference in Noticias de la Rebelión that without being “Informal” intends to “strengthen” the IRF. The anarchist cells of action that claim the International Revolutionary Front do not revolve around any Anarchist Federation that is not based by principle on informal practice.

With these clarifications, I do not try to impose “lines,” much less do I intend to give as finished “something” that can change, not only because it isn’t static but also because it is in constant construction. With this I only want to introduce into discussion the sense of the informal anarchist coordination of which the IRF is part, that in reality has functioned very well, as well as the local FAI and the diverse cells that make it up by means of informal coordination.

Therefore, I consider that on the basis of these principles, when you claim the IRF and the Anarchist Federation, and speak of “strengthening them” it is logical to conclude that you speak of the “Informal” Anarchist Federation. Although the IRF does not contain the word “informal” in its acronyms of presentation, it remains clear to us in its texts that its organizing model is not hierarchical nor centralist, platformist or bureaucratic, but on the contrary is autonomous, free, congruent with the chaotic principles and an example in international solidarity and the global anarchist conspiracy against the system of domination. That is to say, definitively Informal.

Giuseppe Dondoglio Antonlini

_________________
* Gustavo Rodríguez is an anarchist who some leftists and anarcho-leftists including those with “Notices from the Rebellion” have recently slandered, saying that he is on the side of the US government, imperialism and the capitalist system simply because he is critical of the State of Cuba and in particular the regime’s persecution of anarchists living under the Cuban State (the former being a stupid and classic leftist position that makes no sense in reality). – translator note.