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Round-Up June-July 2006
In the North East FRFI activists have been out on the streets of Durham and Newcastle in solidarity with those fighting occupation in Iraq and Palestine. Following Israel’s land invasion of Gaza at the end of June, pickets were held of M & S in Newcastle on 1 July and Durham on 5 July, and we intend to intensify this area of our work in the coming weeks.
The twice-monthly pickets of North Shields Immigration Reporting Centre have now been taking place for over 6 months, and continue. On 22 June FRFI activists working as part of TCAR (Tyneside Community Action for Refugees) helped to organise 'Big Noise II', a nationwide day of action against reporting centres. In addition to North Tyneside, actions took place at reporting centres in Leeds, Manchester and London. When the manager of the North Shields centre, Derek King, refused to come out and accept TCAR's demands, the demands were delivered to the centre anyway, and over 60 protestors, many of them asylum seekers from countries such as Eritrea, the Congo, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Iraq, Iran, Nigeria and the Ivory Coast, took to the streets and marched into the centre of North Shields, where they held a rally and received significant support from local people.
Activists have been steadily building support for Cuba and Venezuela, on the streets and at events such as Newcastle Green Festival on 3 and 4 June and Durham Miners Gala on 8 July. Despite being barred entry by SWP member Simon Hall to a public film showing on 31 May which was supported by Hands Off Venezuela, FRFI activists in Newcastle have since made contact with Hands Off Venezuela’s less sectarian members, and a public meeting was held at Durham Miners Gala at which a member of RATB spoke. On 15 July a Rebel Music gig was held in Durham, with the 'revolutionary punk' of Comunity of Learner and Cheap Antiques raising money towards the FRFI fund drive and the sound system to be donated by the spring 2007 brigade to Cuba.
On 24 June people travelled from Manchester, Glasgow, London and Durham to participate in an Anti-Imperialist Tribunal in Newcastle. Participants from the Congo, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Zimbabwe, Sudan and Jamaica came together to discuss the impact of imperialism on their countries, and the immediate tasks facing us in building an anti-imperialist and anti-racist movement in the heartlands of imperialism.