Christmas in the Protest Camp in Vienna - Refugees in Hungerstrike

Dear citizens,

We, the refugees from the camp in the Sigmund-Freud-Park have the honor to invite you to the most beautiful christmas party of the town that will be happening in front of the Votivkirche.
On 24th of December from 10 p.m. on we will have a Big Christmas-Party with music.
From 6 p.m. you are welcome to sit around the fire and exchange eexperiences.

Because:

The 24th of December is a big festive day.

We celebrate that for one month daily dignity prevails over the humiliations of the asylum system.
That solidarity prooves to be stronger than charity.
That the multilingual and intercultural comunication, the daily work of translation triumphs over the deafness of those who do not want to listen.

One month ago, on 24th of november, we, refugees from different countries, marched 25 km by foot from the central refugee camp in the village of Traiskirchen to Viena in protest against the inhuman conditions in the asylum system.

• That we have to live in overcrowded camps.
  
• That we are provided with interpreters that we often feel as henchmen of a racist system.
  
• That we are made dependent from state welfare because we are not allowed to work and earn our own money.
  
• That we are abnegated asylum without any decent examination of our cases.
  
• That the DUBLIN- law doesn’t allow us to ask for asylum in any other european country. than, where we first arrived.
  
• That we are denied the basic human right of free movement.(First we are not allowe to leave Traiskirchen, if we do so, we have to pay 200 Euros of forfeit, then we are distributed to camps and shelters in remote villages, far away from friends, solidarity and legal advice.)
  
• That economic and social affliction are not accepted as reasons for asylum.

After three weeks of protestcamp in the Sigmund Freud Park and 2128 supporters of our struggle on our website (:: refugeecampvienna.noblogs.org) none of the politically responsible persons of the high authorities was willing to talk with us. So on tuesday 18th, we entered into the Votivkirche in order to seek for help in the church,
where we stay till now.

This finally provoke the Caritas and the Catholic Church to invite representatives of NGOs and of the ministery of the interior to sit on a round table with 3 representatives of our protesting refugees.

Shortly before the round table, 20 policemen searched the refugee camp in order to intimidate the protesters.

All the refugees of the camp went to the round table meeting,. But only 5 of us were admitted.

On the round table the Caritas offered warm places to stay to all of the protesting refugees. We rejected this offer, because we didn’t start this campaign to get warm beds, but to archieve our demands.

We refused to leave the protest camp and the Votivkirche as long as our political demands are not taken and discussed seriously.

We go on claiming:

• The right to work.
  
• The freedom of movement.
  
• The extinction of our fingerprints from EURODAC, after closing an asylum case negatively, in order to make it posible to ask for asylum in another european country.
  
• The right to stay in Austria for all the refugees and migrants who live here in this moment.E.G. an general legalisation or amnesty as it had been realized in Spain and France severall times.

That is to say:
The refugees stay in Votivkirche not because we would not find any shelter, but because we consider that our fight for human rights for all refugees in Austria is more important then a warm night today or tomorrow.

Because the higher authorities instead of fullfilling our demands started to intimidate us with the police, we decided to go on hungerstrike on saturday 22 of December, 11 p.m.
At this moment, there are 27 refugees on hungerstrike.

Come to the refugee camp today!
Bring sweets, firewood and warm blankets.
Bring your instruments and your friends and sing us a song for dignity and human rights for everyone.

Bring along your children.
They will learn more about politics then in any school.
From 6 p.m. : sitting on the fire.
From10 p.m.: Big loud Christsmasparty.

In the refugee camp in the Sigmund-Freud-Park. U 2 Schottentor/ Universität.

Source :: refugeecampvienna.noblogs.org, 24. Dec 2012