IN BERLIN, RADICAL SPACES FACING CAPITALIST EXPROPRIATION CONTINUE TO RESIST WITH SOLIDARITY AND A REVOLUTIONARY MEMORY ~ Josie Ó Súileabháin ~ It starts with a match, a small wooden stick squeezed into the cracks of our urban decay. It can take a drill, a dozen mates and material for barricades to get it going. Don’t talk to bailiffs and keep the door locked. Landlord lives in Barbados, the neighbourhood lives in hell. Rents have doubled in ten years and only 1% of homes are ‘on the market’. Cops are at the door, the heating is cut. In the early hours of the morning on Habersaathstrasse, the cops break down the door of number 46 in an attempt to evict it’s residents. “The cops have entered to ‘prevent danger’ and yes, it’s true, we pose a threat to vacant property managers, speculators, and their accomplices,” wrote the residents of Habersaath46 (Ha46) “but the violence is coming from those who drag people out of their apartments at 6am.” “The operation ended in our hallway. No-one was evicted,” Ha46 reported to the community. The next day, the police came back with a construction crew and attempted to seal the basement door shut, which acts as their emergency exit. The police had earlier confiscated fire extinguishers, making the entire situation a potential fire risk to the tenants. They failed in this attempt and so came back days later to brick up the exit. For the next weeks, the residents of Ha46 have reported that the law firm von Trott zu Solz Lammek has turned the area into a security fortress for their clients Arcadia Estates, using private security to make apartments systematically uninhabitable as a tactic to prevent re-occupation. The law firm is infamous among squatters in Berlin for their reputation of successful evictions by any means. Across the world it is the same story as the corporations owning our homes are international. Yet the solutions can be found locally in our neighborhoods as we resist evictions and intimidation. This revolutionary dynamic between international and local is what is known as the Interkiezionale. In May of this year, squatters attempted to re-occupy the Meuterei (Mutiny) in Kreuzberg, “a place that was not only a bar, it was a place of collective meeting and sharing,” the squatters wrote. “By re-opening the Meuterei one more time, we want to bring to the present those collective moments that brought closer the idea that other worlds are possible.” “We fought in the streets to reclaim our subversive and political ideas through the defence of Liebig34, Potse, Syndikat, Meuterei, Köpi Wagenplatz and Rigaer94. We remember those times with nostalgia, but also with the powerful thoughts that if one time we were able to confront the state and his mercenaries with fierceness, we can and will do it again,” they wrote. REVOLUTIONARY MEMORY A year ago today, an explosion ripped apart an apartment three floors up on Arkadias Street in Athens. Marianna Manoura was inside the apartment when the detonation occurred. “Time froze, everything went black,” Marianna wrote, “and I was unable to move.” Two figures appeared and offered Marianna help as she went looking for her comrade. “I showed them the place where I last saw my companion, the place where our guilty gazes met, glances filled with rage at the world we live in, filled with faith and hunger for moments of true freedom” Marianna wrote in the aftermath. The anarchist Kyriakos Xymitiris was processing explosives in the next room when a technical issue lead to an early detonation and his death. October 31 commemorations in Athens “Although the thread of my comrade’s action would be abruptly cut short, his life and fighting choices would be a historic flash of determined resistance, perseverance, and dedication,” Marianna writes about her late comrade from prison. She was taken to Evangelismos Hospital following the explosion and was unconscious for the next three days. As Marianna regained consciousness, the Greek authorities began to isolate her and held her under 24/hr constant police watch. As is usual with militant partisans, the Greek authorities decided to prosecute the anarchists under terror legislation based on Article 187a. Marianna and Kyriakos were classified as a terrorist organisation and their apartment was defined as a ‘yiafka’ or a kind of crime operation centre. This would pull two other individuals into the investigation to face charges connected to the anarchists, as well as two other anarchists who had no connection to the original defendants. A flimsy case, as usual. To push the narrative, the Greek media did a circus run of pop-psychology takes on the defendants, speculations on class origins and outright character assassination, repeated into a moral panic projected onto a largely religious audience. The role of the Greek state after these anarchists are detained is to cut off prison solidarity and activism by attacking those close to them – seeking total political and social isolation. “But the question is,” writes Marianna, “Who will name whom a terrorist? Who will judge whom?” The role of the mainstream media is to depoliticize resistance into fear-based narratives, projecting the paranoia of the state directly onto the audience. The explosion on Arkadias Street was the incendiary end to the life of an anarchist who was known by the people who survived him beyond militancy and armed revolution. Kyriakos was known as participating locally and internationally. “For a long time Kyriakos walked together with us in the struggles of Berlin,” write the squatters of Meuterei. “Together we defended our self-organised spaces and fought against the process of gentrification that consumes this city and changes it’s social geography benefiting some, while expelling the poor and marginalised people.” “Through Interkiezionale we confronted this process fighting together with other collectives against evictions.” Kyriakos was part of the Meuterei collective before it’s eviction in 2020. “Our community here has changed time and again,” the residents of Rigaer94 wrote this month, currently under the threat of eviction. “We remember you as a tireless fighter,” they write on the coming anniversary of the death of Kyriakos, “as a friend, as a guest and part of our community. You brought people together instead of losing yourself in the stream of the metropolis.” INVESTIGATE YOUR LANDLORD In 2019, I was hiding in an apartment in Neukölln when my local bar announced they were facing eviction from their British landlords. The Syndikat, and Meuterei in neighboring Kreuzberg, were safe havens for me as well as other “danger zones” (kriminalitätsbelasteter orte) designated by the state. “A place to celebrate our friendship and comradeship,” as the squatters of Mutiny wrote. Further investigation revealed that the landlords of the Syndikat is Pears Global, a multi-billion network of 200 companies, subdivisions and shell companies in tax havens like Luxembourg. One company that had gained notoriety in the UK was Bankway, known for focusing evictions on the disabled, elderly, unemployed and single parents. “We are not social landlords” defended Nick Stanley, Bankway’s Estate Manager, “we’re in it to make money. The idea is to maximise the income from the building.” After years of disputes over the ownership of Rigaer94, the Berlin senate in 2020 failed to clarify the identity of the landlord who was seemingly hiding behind a letterbox company based in the British tax haven of Guernsey. Since then there have been multiple police raids on the building in order, according to authorities, to establish the identities of the residents of Rigaer94. 28 August 2025 — The police forcibly entered Rigaerstraße 94 and broke into all apartments. Photo: Björn Obmann/Umbruch Bildarchiv In reality, the police raids only served to attempt to isolate the house and intimidate its occupants, despite the fact that the Berlin authorities could not prove the identity of the individual who owned the building. The owner of Lafone Investments Limited was kept secret through a system of trustees, those who own the company on paper on behalf of those who would rather not be named. Leonid Medved is one of these people. A Ukrainian citizen born in Berlin, Leonid is the managing director of 20 companies all based at the same address in Berlin, along with Igor Lipiak. Some of these companies operate vending machine casinos, others like Centurious Immobilen Handels GmbH exploit the property market. Since Lafone’s trustee stepped down, its managing director is now Leonid Medved. Rigaer94 is now in an absurd situation where the landlord demands anonymity and ownership, and his lawyer is not even sure if they own the property. “I think we even have a house in Germany… I’m not sure though,” Bernau told the court. “We know we have a house here,” Rigaer94 said in response. “We are sure of it. And we will not give up this house without a fight.” A few days before the raid on Rigaer94 this year, a group of people broke into the offices of Leonid Medved and leaked a trove of documents that gives “insight into the machinations of Lafone Investments Limited, Centurious Immobilen Handels GmbH, and the coordinated efforts of police and politicians with the real estate industry,” they said in a statement. Photo: Björn Obmann/Umbruch Bildarchiv As part of the publication of the documents, it was revealed that Igor Lipniak was named by German tax authorities and accused of distributing laptops with software for manipulation of slot machines, cheating both the tax man and in his own gambling halls. “Here, the destruction of existence is enriched,” those behind the leaking of the documents wrote on the damage of gambling halls on the community. INTERKIEZIONALE! “Right from the start of the proceedings, the court announced its clear tendency – Lafone… seems unable to act legally in Germany,” Rigaer94 write. Despite this clear violation of the process, the judge actually offered suggestions on how to resolve the issues and become a legal entity to operate in Germany. This corruption is open for anyone to see, if they could only look. “Solidarity from those whom joined the manifestation in front of the court, those who visited Rigaer94 to reconstruct what was broken after the raid, as well as actions in other cities,” R94 writes on actions  by the community following police repression of the radical space. On September 7, the windows and doors of a restaurant on Orianientburger Strasse were smashed in. Activists used heavy tools to enter through the closed shutters and spray painted “R94 Bliebt!” on the facade. “To avoid traumatising underpaid employees,” they wrote in a statement, “we decided not to conduct the operation during business hours.” The restaurant is owned by the daughter of Leonid Medved. One day later in the Siemensstadt district, four vans belonging to the multi-national real estate corporation Vonovia went up in flames. “For the majority of people in Berlin,” activists wrote in a statement, “the housing situation is an existential catastrophe… rents in the “lower market segment” rose by 11.6% in Berlin.” Vonovia made a profit of €984 million before taxes in the first half of this year. “We sent Vonovia a message in a language they understand,” activists wrote. “We used the tired-and-tested Berlin model as the incendiary device,” referring to a popular time delay igniter. Yet beyond the fire and fury of armed resistance is a politics of solidarity that brings us together as anarchists. “Solidarity is the weapon of the people,” Marianna writes, still in pretrial detention in Korydallos. October 31 must be remembered “as a day of struggle, a day of responsibility, a moment of resistance. Because struggle doesn’t want compromises, it doesn’t want barriers or egos. There’s no room for laws, conventions, or limits. Because struggle requires determination and vision. It requires faith and commitment, it requires true relationships and dedication.” “Because struggle requires humble and willing people. People who are essentially rebellious and consistent,” Marianna writes, “People like Kyriakos.” The post When they kick at our front door appeared first on Freedom News.