Time: 7 pm, Tuesday 24 June 2008

Venue: T&G, Transport House, 128 Theobald’s Road, London WC1X 8TN

Asylum-seekers and migrants who had been locked up indefinitely by the British state are carrying out one of the most sustained fight-backs in the UK in recent years. Three major detention centres (out of 22) have been destroyed, forcing the government to release hundreds of detainees. Hunger-strikes, occupations, naked protests, dirty protests and successful break-outs involving tens and hundreds of detainees have become a regular feature of immigration detention. The government has reacted with brutal levels of repression, using assault, segregation and transfers to prisons to punish the protestors.

The UK government has also tried several times to prosecute those involved in large-scale riots. This has rarely resulted in convictions and has more often led to public humiliation for the government and the private detention contractors. The government is persisting in its plans to rebuild ruined wings and build completely new centres at Brook House (opening 2009), Yarl’s Wood (opening 2010) and Bicester (opening 2012). These will provide more profit-making opportunities for the building contractors and private detention companies but in the end are likely to face the same level of protest.

Protests in detention centres are often ignored by the mainstream media and also by political activists. London No Borders invites you to an info night to discuss why this is the case and to raise awareness of detention centre protests as one of the front lines of current

political resistance. The primary aim is not to plan future actions but to discuss what has happened already and why it has had such a low profile. We particularly welcome ex-detainees who witnessed or participated in detention centre protests and ex-prisoners who could relate this issue to prisoners’ struggles.

No Borders calls for the closure of all detention centres and an end to deportations

Email: noborderslondon@riseup.net

Programme for Radical History Meeting

Tuesday 24 June 2007 - 7 pm

T&G, Transport House, 128 Theobalds Road, London WC1X 8TN

Introduction

Purpose of meeting:

? to raise awareness of detention centre protest as a political movement

? to support current protest by setting it within a historical tradition

Scope of meeting:

? detainee activism in detention

? NOT conditions of detention or surrounding issues about the asylum system, destitution, anti-deportation campaigns etc.

Outline of chronology and main types of resistance and summary of main events.

Speakers from various detention centre protests, including the 2005 Yarl’s Wood mass hungerstrike and the 2006 Harmondsworth uprising

? to talk about the events in which they were involved

? to address some of the following questions if they want to

? What were the triggers for the protests?

? What were the demands? Why were those demands chosen?

? Why did they choose that type of protest? What tactics did the protestors use in the course of their protests?

? How did the protestors organise amongst themselves?

? How did the protestors manage divide and rule tactics by the authorities?

? What outside support did they get? How helpful was it? What kind of support were they hoping to get?

? Outcomes - impact of the protests on conditions and treatment; gains and losses; repression by the authorities

? How did the protests change the way the protestors viewed themselves and their situation?

? Why have the protests had such a low profile relative both to the level of protest and to the profile given by activists to other forms of resistance? What is the relationship between detainee activism and what is called the ‘social movement’? Issues of racism etc.

Open discussion

Groups to give brief outline of current activities

Proposal for working group to create written record of history of detention centre resistance