On April 6 the Olympic torch was to be paraded through the streets of London in what Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell described as a celebration of the "Olympic spirit." Protesters angered by recent Chinese repression in Tibet sought to undermine this Chinese propaganda exercise. As it made its way through London, the flame was greeted by a wave of protest.

Demonstrators disrupted the torch's journey along the thirty one mile route. There were attempts to seize the torch, extinguish the flame and to prevent it making its way through the city with 37 people being arrested. Although Tibet was the main focus of protests, attention was also drawn to Chinese support for Sudanese atrocities in Darfur and Burma's brutal military dictatorship.

Video: Video of the attempted Olympic flame grab!

Photos: Olympic Relay Free Tibet Rally | Olympic torch protests in London - pics | Tibetan Freedom Torch Relay, London April 6, 2008 | Olympic Torch Relay: Heated Arguments in Trafalgar Square | Chinese Torture Torch Relay Shames Olympic Ideals | Police compete in olympic farce | Olympic Torch Chased off the Streets, pics from Fleet Street | Torch Protest hits Whitechapel

Also on the Newswire: Torch Went Out in London Too! | Olympic torch relay protest timeline | Tibet Protest Great, But.... | "Freedom wins" says the Sun | Tibetan Freedom Torch Rally | 36 people arrested so far during the Olympic torch relay in London | Police Manhandle Press at Tibet Demonstration | Brilliant pro Tibet protest ongoing in London today

Links: Beijing 2008 Olympic Games (official site) | Free Tibet Campaign | Students for a Free Tibet

Meanwhile, there have been various meetings to organise opposition to the threat and open a new space. There was also an assembly on the 6th Jan to look at setting up a group to support London social centres and maintain continuity.

RampART legal battle: appeal lodged | court case notes | possesion order granted | court papers served

Background : Audio: Eviction is a comin' | developers make move on Rampart Street | Developments at rampART | The rampART and its evolution

Update: The RTF4 building was illegally evicted and a meeting cancelled on Thursday, 5 April, by private security backed by police.

Four months after the acquittal of the Coronet Five, police again sealed off Holloway Road and provoked a pointless confrontation with people attending a major event on the social calender of the anarchist movement. [Pics: 1 | 2 | video]

The setting this time was Reclaim The Future 4, a networking event which combined workshops, info stalls, cinema screenings, a vegan cafe and party, and was attended by hundreds and hundreds of people [Pics]. The event was held in a squatted building on the Holloway Road, which was formerly a workshop and salesroom for London Taxis.

On Saturday 24th March, the London's collective of Anarchitects called Space Hijackers invited the Whitechapel local community to a 'East End Knees Up' against the fact that the corporate chain Starbucks recentlty opened a new store in the area. Starbucks has a long history of undercutting and closing down local independent cafes, of treating their staff badly, and their coffee growers even worse.

The tea party in "defense of our area, and to show off the lovely culture we have" lasted for about 4 hours. At 1pm a small crowd turned up outside Starbucks to set up a stall and a sound system, and to give out maps of the area which listed alternative local places to buy coffee and keep money within the local community. From then on, many local people that just came across to it joined in for a hot drink or a plate of hot food provided by the group Food Not Bombs. Police eventually stepped in and threatened to arrest those gathering around the stall for obstruction of the highway, although no one was finally arrested.

Photos: 1 | 2 | 3
Related Links: Space Hijackers' Projects Archive | Starbucks - The Faulty Logo | I Hate Starbucks

Over the weekend of 3-4 Feb 2007, actions up and down the country and beyond targeted dangerous 'greenwash' being desperately pushed by corporations and politicians. The actions came in the wake of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report released on Friday, which warned of world temperature rises of over 6C by the end of the century. The report indicated that a 4 degree rise would mean a 10% loss in global food production due to draught, flooding, water shortages. While the world slowly wakes up to the magnitude of climate chaos, Shell and Exxon Mobil last week announced record breaking profits. With the figures laid out so clearly, the nauseating hypocrisy spouted by corporations and politicians has spurred action from Paris to Aberdeen.

Links Press release for oil spill action | action report, photos & video | another video | Shell sponsorship background
Other actions Glasgow | Edinburgh | Plane Stupid | Greenpeace
Coming up Protest against ESSO, 9th Feb | Spring into Action
Climate Camp 2006 indymedia page | website | 2007 Camp 14-21st August | next organising meeting 17-18th Feb

This Saturday 11 June sees the third edition of the infamous Reclaim The Future benefit parties in a self-organised space in London.

RTF III is set to be one of the biggest parties-with-purpose to take place in London for a long time. From eight to eigth 5+ rooms including live stages, bands, djs, chillout, bar, cafe, Indymedia cinema, performance and vjs, will keep the crowd on its toes. Musical flavours will include Punk, Techno, Reggae, Drum & Bass, Breaks, World Music and Cabaret. The address is S&W Nightware Factory, Alie St. E1 near Aldgate East tube station.

The concept of RTF arose from a meeting of London Reclaim The Streets (RTS) on June 2002. The idea and call went out, and soon many of the people from the groups that RTS had spawned came together. These included Indymedia, Wombles, Rhythms of Resistance samba band, London Rising Tide, LARC, Disarm DSEi and it started to grow and grow. Quoting one of the party organisers she states:

"RTF was created as a way to show that the streets are ours and we will not be prevented from partying and protesting by laws which have tried to squash the reclaim the streets movement. RTF is also about working togther for a future that we all want, free from capitalism and freedom from exploitation for all peoples and for a planet free from the destruction and pollution it currently endures."

For more information about past RTF events see:

• Squall review

• RTF I photo gallery

• RTF II photo gallery 1 and 2.

Friday 27 was one of the hottest days in May for decades, and the start of a busy Bank Holiday in London. The same as in every last Friday of the month, several hundred cyclists gathered at the South Bank for the evening’s Critical Mass that has now entered its 12 years of monthly cycle rides through central London. [Report and photos 1 | 2 | 3 and videos 1 | 2 | 3]

On the same evening the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination, together with the Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army and the Church of the Immaculate Consumption arrived in the East End for the London's date of their UK wide G8 touring show. This included a two day intensive Clown Army training to prepare for this summer’s G8 Mobilisations in Scotland, as well as a show, films and free food [Report and Photos 1 | 2 | 3]

Saturday 28 also saw the London date of the 2012 Show; "a seven year trip that aims to create a creative space for change before it is too late”. In the event, this was an all nighter with music, poetry, performance, visuals and info stalls.

On Monday Bank holiday the annual Kingston Green Fair took place; a one day festival organised by local environmental activists that began in 1987 [Report and Photos 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 and videos]. The event offered a broad programme of music as well as art and info stalls, cafes, community groups spaces and more, all powered by renewable sources.

The UK has had its share of squatted political spaces over the decades but the last few years has seen something of a resurgence in activity, inspired by the strong social centres movement found in Spain and Italy etc. Social Centres have been springing up all over the country but their existence is often precarious, dependent either on maintaining rent or retaining a squatted property.

The average lifespan of a squat typically clocks in at around three months. However the rampART (www.rampart.co.nr) will be celebrating its first anniversary this weekend (21st May)

Established May 21st 2004, rampART took it's name from Rampart Street E1, home of the abandoned warehouse which was previously used as an Islamic girls school. For the last twelve months the derelict building has hosted over 100 cultural and political events - placing the rampART firmly and literally on the activist map of London (see ramPARTY details and lineup)

Other coming events:
22nd May - Movimientos Day School | 27th May - Post-criticalmass G8 Bike Ride Benefit (flyer) | >28th May - GUADALAJARE Benefit

Other UK social centres:
See and add to user contributd list | Institute of Autonomy opens | Leeds gets new social centre | Search indymedia.org.uk for social centres

To celebrate 10 years of critical mass, over 800 cyclists took to the streets in London last year with a bike samba band, live guitar from a rickshaw, multiple sound systems, mad bikes the like of which have to be seen to be believed. It was massive, and it happened again on Friday April 29. At least 500 cyclists, rollerbladers and skateboards joined the 11th Annivesary in London [photos 1, 2, 3, report]. There will also critical masses in Glasgow, Liverpool and Nottingham [photos] - and probably other cities around the country as well.

On Saturday 30th April there was a successful mass "against climate change, pollution and the G8" in Worthing, Sussex. Meanwhile, in Sheffield on June 11th and the 15th there are more rides to coincide with an anti-war demo and the G8 meeting of Justice and Interior Ministers in Sheffield taking place 15th/17th.

Indymedia Cinema presents a five-day festival of radical and independent film from Argentina, Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico, Cuba, Bolivia, Chile, Peru and more. There will also be talks and presentations by Latin American solidarity groups, international activists, and film-makers, as well as Latin American food, drink, and music.

When: The festival takes place from Tuesday 22nd to Saturday 26th February. Programme starts daily at 7pm, and on Saturday there's a doouble session starting at 2pm. All sessions are free but donations are encouraged.
Where: RampArt Creative centre, Rampart Street (off Commercial Rd), London E1. Nearest tube Whitechapel, buses 115, 15, 25, 254, 205.

FULL PROGRAMME:

Tuesday 22:
'EYE OF THE STORM' (Argentina Indymedia Resistance Film) and 'THE TAKE' (film about a worker-occupied factory in Argentina by Avi Lewis asn Naomi Klein)
Wednesday 23:
Short films from Cuba, and 'VENEZUELA FROM BELOW' (a film by Dario Azzelini and Oliver Ressler on the latest developments of the Venezuelan Revolution) With film-makers Q&A.
Thursday 24:
'BOLIVIA BASTA' (a film about gas privatisation in Bolivia) and 'PLAN COLOMBIA' (a film about US intervention in Colombia)
Friday 25:
Two short films from visiting CIPO-RFM Mexican Indigenous activists from the state of Oxaca, plus two Zapatista films 'EL FUEGO Y LA PALABRA' and 'CARACOLES'.
Saturday 26 (from 2pm):
'TRADING FREEDOM' indymedia film on the FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas) and 'EL DERECHO DE VIVIR EN PAZ' (the story of the assassination and torture of popular singer and composer Victor Jara by Pinochet regime in Chile) With singer Silvia Rox singing Victor Jara. plus Peruvian film and Peruvian singer Sofia Buchuck...
Then, from 7pm:
Cuban and Colombian HIP-HOP films and Live Music: 'INVENTOS: HIP HOP CUBANO' provides a unique insight into the realities and politics of contemporary Cuba. And 'ZONA MARGINAL', a documentary about the hip-hop group Zona Marginal and their work with the communities in Colombia.

This last year has been a pretty active and productive year for the social centres movement in the UK...

At the begining of the year, the Wombles occupied 93 Fortess Rd for several months before moving into the ex-Grand Banks in Tufnell Park. Both occupations saw successfully resistance against eviction and were highly successful and popular. After eviction in August the wombles took a break to concentrate on the 'Beyond ESF event' but they'll be back in 2005.

Perhaps also to return in 2005, Use Your Loaf, an ex-bakery in Deptford which had been occupied as a centre for social solidarity since summer 2002, but was finally evicted in September. Currently without a building, the collective has remained active and are having a xmas party this coming Friday.

Also having a party on the Friday 17th AND Saturday 18th Dec, the 'rampART' in East London [details] . The building opened around six months ago and has been host to a wide variety of political and cultural events. To celebrate and raise funds to cover bills, there is a two day festival with bands, workshops, DJs, fashion show, VJs, films etc. Full details on www.rampart.co.nr

On the 14th November outside the recording studios in Hampstead where "Do They Know It's Christmas" - Band AID 20 (named after the 20-year anniversary of the original) was being re-recorded, demonstrations took place by protesters arguing that Band Aid is little more than a screen "whitewashing the real issues behind world poverty". Shouts of 'real aid, not band aid', 'don't whitewash Africa' and boo's were audiable over the screams of fans and onlookers. One protester was arrested for handing out leaflets explaining the reasons for the protest - [read full report].

Protesters from the Dissent! Network, organising against the G8 Summit, argue that the song is obnoxious, patronising and out of date with the real situation in Africa

"This isn't about creating a record to support people in Africa- this is a kodak moment for Bono, Midge Ure and for Blair to manipulate public opinion and push through a destructive economic agenda to serve Western economic interests."

As Britain gears up for the G8 summit next July, Blair's government together with Bono and Geldof are doing everything they can to convince the public into believing that real action is being taken on issues such as Climate change and poverty in Africa.

The original Band AID single produced in 1984 raised £9.5 million. The 2003 G8 summit in Evian cost £400 million. The security budget for the 2005 summit in Scotland is set at £150 million. The war in Iraq has so far cost the UK taxpayer £80 billion pounds and rising. The continuing loss of life due to poverty and war is unquantifyable.

International development campaigners - the World Development Movement (WDM) - also condemned the lyrics as promoting a "negative and inaccurate picture of Africa and its problems." The organisation, which has been campaigning on issues effecting Africa for over 30 years and was one of the founders of both the fair trade movement and Jubilee 2000, drew attention to several lines in the song which it described as "patronising, false and out of date".

Director of WDM, Mark Curtis said on Tuesday 14th: "The song perpetuates the myth that Africa’s problems can somehow be blamed on lack of rainfall and failed harvests. It conjures up an image of a continent inhabited entirely by starving children with flies on their faces sitting in the sunbaked bed of a dried up stream."

"African poverty is not an unfortunate accident of geography and climate. It is largely the result of damaging policies such as free trade forced on Africa by rich countries."

Several initiatives are now underway to re-write the lyrics - upload your own, or send lyrics or recorded audio files to doyouknowitscapitalism@yahoo.co.uk

A young mother with triplets and an elderly couple, who had lived on their own land at Paynes Lane, Lower Nazeing, Essex, for l4 years, along with other families were evicted in June. Another man was sent to prison for 28 days for living on his own land, and a judge is threatening to imprison his wife and children if they don't move from land they bought at Colney Hatch. The council now hope to evict the last remaining couple from Paynes Lane on 22nd August, despite the fact that they have been paying council tax for over 10 years.

Anti-racist and Gypsy Council campaigners are planning a rally to counter the eviction at Paynes Lane on the 22nd August. The rally will include the unveiling of a Memorial Field for Roma victims of the Holocaust, and will celebrate the survival of Romani culture with music and food.

Anti-racist campaigners also demonstrated last Saturday near Cambridge. Local residents protested against neo-fascists outside the Oakington Immigration Detention Centre.

Previous coverage: [1][2][3][4][Photos]
Links: [Traveller Support][East Anglia Social Forum]
Calls for rally at Paynes Lane, 22nd August: [1][2]

Read more >>

Anarchism on wheels? Or just a bunch of cyclists getting together on a Friday evening? Sit back, close your eyes and imagine a thousand people cycling along a central London street... filling the street... there aren't any cars... the noise of the traffic is drowned out by music, whistles, bike bells and people having conversations while cycling together…

On the last Friday of April 1994 London’s first Critical Mass took place with about 50 cyclists, and this month's ride on Friday 30th April will be a celebration of 10 years of reclaiming London’s tarmac.

The accepted bid is for a forum on October 15-17, centred at Alexandra Palace, with fees around £30/40 for unwaged/waged (£10 cheaper if pre-paid), accommodating 20-40,000 people without using "spillover areas" (more). This contrasts with Paris where the average fee was around 10 euros and 52,000 people attended - but the Paris organisers were given millions of euros from the government. Read more >>