Call for a 1st of March against the reigns of fear and the European borderegime

It wasn't necessary to wait until today to know that the so-called moderate regimes of the Mediterranean had among their tasks that of repressing the freedom of movement of migrants. Shocking images are arriving however in these hours from Libya, where the Gheddafi regime is repressing the legitimate protests of that which until yesterday it called its own people in a bloodbath. Let us not forget that the Libyan government is a lynchpin of the Italian-and thus European-migratory policies. For years Italian governments have made agreements with the Libyan government in order to externalize the dirty work of repression of migrants trying to reach Europe. The results have been thousands of dead in the Libyan Desert, thousands of prisoners in Libyan detention centers, without any rights, at the will of a regime that shows its true face bombing its own citizens as they protest.

In front of all of this there cannot be hesitations, it is necessary to choose once again on what side one is: either in defense of policy based on the ideology of controlled migrations one continues to seek the support of whoever blocks migrants, or otherwise one supports the end of those policies inaugurated by the readmission agreements and the politics of deportations.

The silence and the hesitations of the Italian government and of many political forces, worried about hypothetical "invasions" demonstrate the hypocrisy of Italian politics. To all of them we wish to say their "concern" for years has handed migrants over to the harshest repression, against all international laws, without any respect for human rights. It is time to say stop, and to respond with mass protest: it is not only the policies carried out within Italy that concern us, but also that which the Italian government does and promotes outside of its own borders. Behind the mask of cooperation Italy and the European Union are responsible for the policies carried out by dictatorial governments against migrants and their own citizens, governments which are given technical, economical and military aid. In these last weeks, with amazing cynicism, in front of the struggle for freedom of thousands of women and men, the only concern seems to have been of an "invasion of the desperate". There is no invasion. Let there be an end to the reign of fear in Italy and in Libya. Those women and men seek with courage the hope of freedom and of a better life. There are those that fear Islamic fundamentalism and a new caliphate at the gates of Italy, while in reality all that one can observe is a healthy fundamentalism of freedom.

We have already affirmed the connection that exists between the strugge for freedom in Africa and the struggles of migrants in Europe. The first of March there will be a day of strikes and mobilization of migrant labor, against the blackmail of the Bossi-Fini Law, against institutionalized racism and for the rights of all. After last year's mobilization, from the Rosarno revolt to the strike and protest on the crane at Brescia and the tower at Milan, this year migrants will return to a protagonist's role in social struggles. With them there will be many Italian workers and students. It is a protest that is spreading to various European countries: last year in France, Greece and elsewhere, this year in Austria, because the migrants' strike speaks of the possibility to defend and extend the rights of all.

We direct an appeal to all that this day of migrant struggle also becomes a general mobilization against the repression in act and that on way, against the European borderregime and against European complicity with murderous regimes. As well as bringing into the streets the battle against the Bossi-Fini and institutionalized racism in Italy, the first of March will also be an occasion to show our support for these revolts (from Tunisia to Egipt, from Morocco to Lybia from Bahrein to the next struggle) of women and men free to choose their own destiny.

We also express our support and solidarity with the 300 migrants that in Athens and Thessaloniki, in Greece, are on hunger strike since the 25th of January: your struggle is our struggle, your demands, our demands, against racism, for the regularization of all migrants!

We want:

• the end of all financial, logistic and military aid finalized at the repression of migrants, starting from the treaty with Libya
  
• the end of the policy of externalization of European borders through funding of and treaties with bordering countries in the function of repressing migrants.
  
• the closing of all migrant detention centers financed by Italy in Libya and other countries
  
• the closing of Frontex, the only existing European military force, that is used to try and stop migrants, forcing them every time to seek more dangerous routes
  
• the end of attempts to repel migrants that have had as their only result the increase of deaths in the Mediterranean and elsewhere.

Migrant Coordination of Bologna - towards the 1st of March 2011
Info: coo.migra (at) yahoo.it