From: Michael Jovic <michael-AT-nildram.co.uk>
Subject: Fw: Radikal
Date: Tue, 3 Sep 1996 17:19:04 -0000


Comrades,

Thought that you might be interested in the following:

----------
> Subject: Radikal: German State tries to forbid left-wing newspaper. 
> 	 Urgent action needed.
> 
> Today 2-9-1996, our ISP XS4ALL got a phonecall that the German
> Authorities are planning to force German Internet Providers to
> shutdown all traffic from and to XS4ALL. This because of the
> Radikal-pages on the xs4all WWW-server.
> We are calling for people to mirror this site. Our goal is that in
> the shortest possible time Germany will cut off all IP-traffic
> comming from and going to all other countries (We aim to make
> Germany cut off all IP-traffic in the shortest possible time), so that
> they will isolate and senzor their own "digital highway". Help
> germany to isolate itself. Download a copy of this site
> and make a mirror.
> 
> http://www.xs4all.nl/~radikal
> 
> We, Solidaritygroup with Political Prisoners, have started this site
> after the attack from the german goverment in summer'95 in solidarity
> with the people who were jailed after a brutal raid then, and because
> we find it important that the Radikal can be distributed without
> (german) gouvernement interverance.
> 
> Attached is a letter of Felipe, chairman of XS4ALL, and a short
> text taken of a statement by some Radikal groups where they tell 
> what the Radikal is.
> 
> SPG-Amsterdam (2nd september 1996)
> 
> First reaction of Felipe, chairman of XS4ALL:
> Date: Monday, 02-Sep-96 01:15 PM 
> From: Felipe Rodriquez 
> Subject: Radikal website(http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/radikal/index.htm)
> forbidden in Germany
> 
> Hello, 
> Today XS4ALL heard from a colleague provider in Germany that soon the
> access to XS4ALL will be closed for german internet users. This is
> because
> of the webpages of the magazine 'Radikal' that are on XS4ALL. 
> 
> http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/radikal/index.htm 
> 
> This magazine is illegal in Germany because so-called TERRORISTS are
> said
> to be part of the organisation and because the magazine is said to be
> calling for radical actions against the german gouvernment. 
> 
> The only way for them to block access to this site, is to block out
> XS4ALL
> completely, we expect this to take place shortly. 
> 
> Xs4all is not planning to ask Radikal to find another provider, neither
> from the Dutch gouvernment nor from the German gouvernment have there
> been
> formal requests towards Xs4all.
> 
> People who feel the need to donate webspace to Radikal can contact
> tank-AT-xs4all.nl, spreading the information makes it harder to block
> specific sites such as xs4all.
> 
> Felipe 
> 
> This is a E-mail from the db-nl mailing list, sent by Felipe Rodriguez,
> chairman of xs4all.nl 
> 
> Who We Are -- part of the statement by some radikal groups-- summer 1995
>      We produce and distribute a magazine. A magazine which, in a
> time of state control and self-censorship, is a forum for a
> discussion of street militancy and armed struggle. Of course, we
> aren't "neutral" in this discussion. We fundamentally reject the
> notion that the state has a monopoly on the legitimate use of
> force. The existing social conditions can only be changed if
> left-radical groups and associations build up their abilities and
> structures so as to be able to counter some of these effects even
> today. This, of course, includes militant and armed intervention,
> but these would be empty gestures if there wasn't also some sort
> of linkage or means of conveying their message. Of course, we are
> very happy when militant anti-fascist initiatives disrupt Nazi
> meetings. So we also see one of our functions as exposing fascist
> structures so as to make both old and new Nazis attackable, and
> we think this is one very important aspect of anti-fascist work.
> 	Of course, it would have been awesome if the cover of our
> next issue had had a big picture of the new deportation prison in
> Berlin-Grunau reduced to rubble. All people who seek to intervene
> and oppose Germany's refugee policies would have been overjoyed
> at this disruption of the state's deportation machinery. A
> radical-left which takes the past 25 years of its history
> seriously must discuss the successes and failures of the various
> armed and militant groups, such as the RAF, the 2nd of June
> Movement, the Revolutionary Cells, and militant autonomist
> groups, and it must draw consequences for the future from this
> discussion.
>      In order that we don't just keep looking back at our
> history, but rather so that we keep up to date with actual
> developments, it's important that we be active in current
> anti-fascist initiatives or, for example, discuss the politics of
> the AIZ, of whom we are very critical. We must continually fight
> for the necessary space to carry out such discussions and defend
> ourselves from state attacks. Radikal tries to do jut that, no
> more, no less. We try to make it possible for various structures
> to have a means of being heard on a regular basis. It's seem like
> we're stating the obvious when we say that the cop attacks on
> Radikal are, at the same time, a criminalization of other leftist
> structures which provide this necessary space, like infoshops and
> other magazines for example.
>      The present attacks on us, however, are qualitatively
> different than past repressive campaigns for two fundamental
> reasons. Firstly, we have now been declared a "criminal
> organization", and secondly, it has now been stated that Radikal
> has "entirely criminal content". A look back at the last few
> issues, therefore, will reveal what criminal means: new
> anti-racist street names in Braunschweig, articles on nationalism
> and the liberation struggle in Kurdistan, an analysis of the
> history of patriarchal gender divisions, an appeal from
> non-commercial radio stations, debates about leftist campaigns
> surrounding the May 8th commemorations...that's criminal content?
> Before, the authorities used to point out specific articles which
> "supported a terrorist organization" so as to criminalize them,.
> Now the cops don't want to go through all that trouble so they
> have just called the entire project a "criminal organization",
> therefore the content must be criminal, too. But it's the mixture
> of theory and actual attacks, discussion and practical tips,
> which makes Radikal so interesting to read for so many people.
> And we value this mixture. Radikal aims to mobilize people to
> oppose Nazis and to stop the Castor nuclear waste shipments,
> while at the same time giving information about debates on
> anti-nationalism or the background of the origins of capitalist
> and patriarchal social structures. What's more, it should offer
> space for people from even the most remote corners of Germany to
> discuss their actions or their difficulties, things which have
> been ignored for far too long by a jaded left fixated on the
> metropoles. The federal police have called this mixture criminal.
> 	 If you listen to what the cops say about all of this, it
> sounds like some sort of cheesy novel. We are supposedly
> organized in a "highly conspiratorial manner" with "fixed
> organizational structures". It seems that really banal things are
> actually dangerous. Anyone who produces a magazine needs "fixed
> organizational structures", they need to sit down together and
> talk about what should go into the next issue and how to
> distribute the magazine, mail out subscriptions, write articles,
> answer letters from readers, and so on and so forth. The only
> difference between us and normal, legal magazines is the fact
> that we have removed ourselves from state control, out of the
> reach of the censorship authorities. Over the years, we have
> built up an organizational structure which allows us to
> distribute a relatively high number of magazines nation-wide, by
> radical-left standards that is. As with other groups who seek to
> build up open or hidden structures, we are subject to state
> repression. From their point of view, the BAW had good reason to
> act now, since all their previous actions against us had been
> fruitless. Radikal kept being published, and there was nothing
> they could do about it
>      In 1982, about 20 homes, bookstores, and printing shops were
> raided in an attempt to prosecute Radikal for "supporting a
> terrorist organization". In 1984, 2 supposed editors of the paper
> were sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison, but they avoided going
> to the slammer by getting elected to the European Parliament for
> the Greens. In 1991, the federal prosecutor exchanged the jail
> terms for a fine. The next step came in 1986, when Radikal was
> already organized underground. Now, 100 homes and shops were
> raided by the cops. Nearly 200 court cases were opened, and in
> the end 5 people were given suspended sentences of 4-10 months.
> The wave of repression in 1986 - in addition to the obvious aims
> of scaring people and just being repressive - had one major aim,
> namely to drive Radikal out of the public realm and to lessen its
> effectiveness. But that didn't succeed. Despite the fact that
> several book stores, most of which dated back to Radikal's legal
> days, backed out on us and left us with heavy debts, work on
> Radikal and its distribution became much more decentralized. A
> network of groups and individuals took up responsibility for the
> magazine, based on their conditions. In 1989, the state
> authorities went into action one more time after ID-Verlag in
> Amsterdam published an interview with us as a brochure.<P>
> 	The latest moves by the BAW have again made it clear that
> claims by the mainstream media and left-liberals concerning armed
> groups - "Your attacks make it possible for the state to turn the
> screws of repression even tighter!" - are total crap. Even the
> cease-fire from the guerrilla did not open up any "new levels of
> social debate". The defenders of law and order are continuing to
> act against left-radical groups, who are all equally defined as
> dangerous, and these are attacked at the same high level.
>      4 people are now in prison! (remember, this statement is from
> summer 1996 - all 4 people are released in dec. 1996)We can't just
> forget that fact.
> In any case, that's why we'd like to call for exchange and
> communication with the solidarity groups. The charges against the
> 4 are as follows: They produced and distributed Radikal. But who
> actually "produces" Radikal? Those people who send in reports of
> antifa actions, or is it those people that take 10 copies and
> give them to their friends to read, or maybe it's those people
> that write a few articles and do some lay-out, or maybe it's the
> people that see to it that a few copies get into the prisons? Or
> maybe the BAW thinks it's those people that discuss for weeks on
> end which articles should go in the next issue of Radikal? Or is
> the ones who stand for long hours behind the printing presses?
> 	We're not really sure who exactly the cops are referring to
> when they talk about Radikal, but we know they really mean all of
> us! All people who see the continued need for radical-left
> structures for discussion and communication, away from state
> control and the apparatus of repression. And all people who
> recognize the need for women and men to become organized to avoid
> being swallowed up by capitalist and patriarchal reality. That's
> why it's the task for all of us to not accept this attack nor to
> let it go unanswered.
> 
> We need an uncontrollable resistance media!
> Read, use, distribute, and stay Radikal!
> Powerful greetings to Rainer, Ralf, Werner, and Andreas!
> Free the prisoners!
> The teeth will show whose mouth is open!
> 
> some Radikal groups - Summer 1995
> translation: Arm The Spirit

Fraternally,

Mike Jovic
Hertfordshire
England


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