June 25th Day of Solidarity Sees Action in 5 Countries

On Monday, June 25^th anarchist unions rallied against state repression in at least 12 cities across five different countries at US embassies and Department of Justice (DOJ) offices.

Demonstrators called on the United States to drop charges against the 39 remaining J20 defendants, those arrested at Standing Rock, black liberation activists, and other dissidents facing an ongoing crackdown on political organizing.

Demonstrations took place in Berlin, Germany; Palma, Spain; Bern, Switzerland; Toronto, Canada; and in the US in Atlanta, Baltimore, Kansas City, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, North Carolina, Olympia, and at the US Attorneys’ Office in Washington, DC. Banners were also dropped in Chicago.

These rallies were organized by revolutionary and anarchist unions such as the National Confederation of Labor (CNT) in Spain, the Free Workers’ Union (FAU) in Germany, and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in North America.

The FAU rallies at a US embassy in Berlin. Read the FAU solidarity statement here.

The CNT pickets a US embassy in Palma

A demo at a US embassy in Bern, Switzerland.

The IWW rallies at a US embassy in Toronto

The IWW pickets the US Attorneys’ Office at Judiciary Center in Washington, DC

IWW and GDC pickets DOJ office in the Twin Cities.

In a call to action released earlier this month, the IWW wrote:

From the beginning, the J20 case has represented an escalation of the state’s attempts to criminalize revolutionary politics. The riot act is an archaic law with a racist history … we live in an era when fascists and white supremacists can attack us in the streets without legal consequence, but antifascists face over 60 years in prison for a demonstration.

As revolutionists, and as labor militants, we are well acquainted with the old principle “an injury to one is an injury to all.” It was coined generations ago when anticapitalist resistance in America was similarly under attack after the Haymarket riots. We know solidarity is our best weapon, and we know the state is afraid of us building interconnected social movements and discovering that our struggles overlap. Our resilience is evidenced by the fact that we’re still fighting; our potential is evidenced by the lengths our enemies will go to stop us. The criminal justice system seeks to strangle our voices by brute force. Soon, there will come a day when our silence is more powerful.

-from a defendant