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-------- Forwarded Message --------
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<td>Call for International Solidarity with Housing Justice
Activists in Dublin</td>
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<th valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT" nowrap="nowrap">Date: </th>
<td>Tue, 4 Sep 2018 16:51:59 +0100</td>
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<th valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT" nowrap="nowrap">From: </th>
<td>Outreach IHN <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:outreach.ihn@gmail.com"><outreach.ihn@gmail.com></a></td>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Stand in Solidarity the Take Back the City Campaign in Dublin</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Hi all,</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Ireland</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> is suffering from an extreme housing crisis. There are </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">10,000 people homeless</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> - people live in hubs, hotels, hostels and in cardboard encampments that crop up across our city every night. </span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:transparent;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">We face some of the most extortionate rents in the world, rents that continue to rise, and we also have some of the longest waiting lists for social housing in Europe. The state prefers to protect the interests of massive foreign vulture funds and the rich rather than those of ordinary people.</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">In July 2018, grassroots housing and homeless action groups, migrant and student groups met to figure out how we can support each other to tackle the worsening crisis. An occupation was planned tackling a known slum landlord who evicted 120 tenants in May, Pat O Donnell. On the 7th of August activists from 7 grassroots groups, joined together under the name </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City,</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> took over one of his buildings that had been lying empty for months in the middle of a housing crisis.</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Numerous public events and rallies led after 10 days to a second occupation on North Frederick St in Dublin’s Inner City. </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> continues to demand that all the empty properties in the city be turned over to the local communities to be used as public housing.</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">On Wednesday 26th of August, the landlord of the occupied property at North Frederick Street received a High Court injunction against the activists. However, the occupants refused to leave, and several large shows of community strength outside the property forced the landlord to back off. Now, as the </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> campaign enters its fifth week, and its second week since the injunction, the occupants are </span><span style="text-decoration-line:underline;font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"><a href="https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/were-not-going-anywhere-firework-and-pellets-thrown-at-protesters-refusing-to-leave-property-despite-high-court-injunction-37263952.html" style="text-decoration-line:none" moz-do-not-send="true">still holding strong</a></span><span style="color:rgb(29,33,41);font-family:Arial;font-size:10pt;white-space:pre-wrap"> against the forces of the state. </span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">The connections between the struggle for housing justice in Ireland and other movements around the world have been highlighted throughout the campaign. Migrant groups such as </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Brazilian Left Front</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> (BLF) and </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Migrants and Ethnic Minorities for Reproductive Justice</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> (MERJ) have been involved in the action from the beginning. Since the beginning of the campaign, activists from the South African movement of Shack-dwellers </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Abahlali baseMjondolo </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">and London-based housing activist group </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Focus E15 Mothers</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> have been invited to speak at the occupations, making links between the struggles for housing justice across international borders.</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">We at </span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-weight:700;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"> are calling on all our international supporters to stand with us in solidarity - something as simple as sending a message of solidarity or standing with a sign. Just send any photographs to this email, or to the Facebook page </span><a
href="https://www.facebook.com/TakeBackTheCityDublin/"
style="text-decoration-line:none" moz-do-not-send="true"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;text-decoration-line:underline;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City - Dublin</span></a><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">, or tag us in any posts on social media. All support helps us to maintain the strength to continue to defy the courts and resist the injunction.</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Solidarity,</span></p>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Take Back the City</span></p>
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