English

Lessons for Anarchists

Corner of the Empire

Turn of the century was time of extraordinary rapid changes in the Finnish society. Feudalism in its full form, serfdom, was never implemented in Finland, but still the social tensions were rapidly increasing. World trade volumes rapidly increasing due to imperialism demanded huge amounts of timber for building ships, which provided an influx of capital to agrarian Finnish economy, which before had been hardly more advanced than empire in general. This growth in material well-being together with end of a 300 year period of a colder climate which caused a series of famines (last one in 1869) and other developments in agriculture and trade resulted a rapid growth of the rural population, which quickly aggravated land problem and created urban proletariat (although Finland remained an agrarian country until 1950’s-1960’s).

Parallel to class conflict, political conflict on status of the autonomy was escalating. Ever since Russian takeover in 1809, Tsars were beloved in Finland and as a rule they considered Finland more loyal than any other part of the empire. This was due to wide autonomy originally granted by Alexander I and widened by Alexander II to include features such as independent military force and own currency. Nothing like this existed under previous Swedish rule, continuation of which would have meant a total assimilation of Finnish in a few hundred years if not decades. General loyalty of the Finnish stands as a stark contrast to rebellious Poles, and is nowadays seldom remembered, because today the whole construction of the Finnish nationhood is founded on anti-Russian sentiments. But until beginning of the 20th century, any efforts of Russian revolutionaries to gain allies among Finnish nationalists such as Bakunin’s “letter to Finnish patriots” in 1861 were all in vain.

On Saturday, the gay pride parade in Tallinn was attacked; 15 people were injured. The parade was delayed for 20 minutes after there was a false bomb threat made. The parade was the culmination of a week of related events in the Estonian capital. Anarchists from PunaMust marched in the parade with a banner reading "Anarchists against Homophobia".

On Wed 9th of August, Krzysztof Wantoch-Rekowski - a longtime activist of the Polish Anarchist Federation and Food Not Bombs from Poznań - was detained by the police. He has been put into jail for six weeks for... destroying his identity card (article 276 of the Penal Code).

For the past week, the League of Polish Families have been agitating for introducing the death penalty in the case of pedaphiles who murder children. This is something of a test case for the right-wing, who in general support the death penalty and are looking to introduce it.

On July 27,2006, the police and security forces of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan opened fire on 700 workers of the Tasloja Cement Factory near the city of Suleiumanyia in the Iraqi Kurdistan. Three workers were killed and sixteen more were injured in this cruel attack.

A man died in a hospital in Raciborz. The hospital used to have 13 anestesiologists but now has 3. The hospital fired 10 people because they didn't want to give raises. Polish anestesiologists make up from maybe 20% of medical professional leaving Poland.

News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
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On the weekend of July 22-23, the first congress of Students' Iniative took place in Warsaw. (Click on czytaj dalej for more. Registered users can set English as their default language.)

James Bond, fear and the funniest police custody I ever had Midnight on the Leningrad station in Moscow. I feel like a spy, all the time watching out for civil and uniformed state protectors, who could assume from my outer appearance some kind of connection with the G8 protests. I see a lot of known faces, people I have met in the Libertarian Forum that took place here in Moscow during the last week. Here at the station we almost don't pay attention to each other, everybody tries to be the unsuspicious tourist. Only for short moments people meet to whisper a bit.

Solidarity action in Estonia 19th of July action at 6 o clock in Tallinn in front of the Russian embassy (street: Pikk 19) to protest against human-rights violations during the G8 summit and to show our solidarity to our friends who are still in prison there.

43 year-old Abdel Mandili is a teacher from the suburbs of Warsaw. He is an emigrant from Morocco who has lived in Poland for 13 years and has a Polish family. On Sunday he was attacked at a theatre festival and is in the hospital.

Today was a meeting to resume the summit activities in moscow with around 40 people, in Piter there are still 4 people in prison.

The League of Polish Families has filed a charge to the prosecutor against 4 anti-nationalist activists who came to a meeting in Olsztyn with the leader of the party and education minister, and the founder of a nationalist group "All-Polish Youth", Roman Giertych. The activists were accused of "indecent conduct, clapping and smiling during the singing of the national anthem". The activists can face a penalty of 14 days in prison or a fine.Zaczek

One of the most beautiful and rich in flora natural areas in Poland, the Rospuda valley near Augustow may be in danger of being destroyed.

Just some of the memories from the 48 hours of the russian state hijcking action on my person on 16-18.07.2006: kicks and trounches strikes hit my legs during moment of arrest on the Nevskiy Protest.