No Borders Nottingham » No Detention

No Borders Nottingham info-nights

root — Thu, 20 May 2010 13:27:18 +0000

As advertised on Notts Indymedia, No Borders Nottingham held the first in series of info-nights on Wed. 19 May, 7pm, at the Sumac Centre. The first info-night was on Detention and Deportation. The next info-night is on June 23rd on Capitalism and Migration, venue details to be announced.

Schedule

19 May – Detention and Deportation
23 June – Capitalism and Migration
21 July – Frontex
25 Aug. – Clandestinity and the struggle of migrants
22 Sept. – European migration policy

In preparation for the Brussels No Borders Camp in September, Nottingham No Borders is holding a series of info nights as an introduction into the topics that will be discussed at the camp. With films, food, and lots of interesting discussion, we hope to create an informal and open space for those who may be new to the politics of No Borders as well as those who would like the chance to delve more deeply into the details of the UK and European border regime and how it can be challenged.

Detention and Deportation
Wednesday 19 May, 7pm, Sumac Centre

The system of detention and deportation is one of the main ways in which the state attempts to control migration and violently curtail people’s freedom to move. What can we do to work in solidarity with those in detention? How do we challenge the private companies that make a profit from running detention centres and forcibly removing people? Is there a wider battle to be fought against the prison system as a whole?

Death in detention – UK as a country of sanctuary?

nobordersnottm — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 12:01:57 +0000

Today, at Oakington detention centre in Cambridgeshire, many other migrant people held there against their will have protested following the death of a 40 year old man earlier in the morning:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/8623025.stm
Downplaying the seriousness of another death in a detention centre and the response by detainees, press have reported that cops have been sent in to negotiate about the ‘disturbance’, backed up by ‘protective kit’ (as if it’s police safety that is the issue here rather than the safety of the people locked up in an old RAF base converted into a prison!). But this should not be downplayed. Death in detention is certainly not a new phenomenon. As long ago as 2005 deaths and suicides in detention centres were being highlighted:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/inquiry-urged-over-increase-in-detention-centre-deaths-507156.html

Nor is the brave response by those detained a new thing. In 2004 persons held by Her Majesty’s government rioted after one death at Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre near Heathrow airport.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/death-in-cell-sparks-riot-at-detention-centre-for-immigrants-553898.html

Detainees who resist their treatment and incarceration must be supported by anyone with an ounce of humanity. Deaths in custody must not go unnoticed. All immigration detention centres must be closed immediately. 9 deaths in UK detention centres are documented here but there have been more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_in_custody

SOLIDARITY WITH YARL’S WOOD HUNGER STRIKERS

nobordersnottm — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 10:58:01 +0000

DEMO AT SERCO OFFICES, 18-22 HAND COURT, HOLBORN, LONDON WC1V 6JF.
FRIDAY 19th FEBRUARY, 2.30pm

Over 50 women have been on hunger strike at Yarls Wood Immigration
Prison near Bedford since Friday 5th February, demanding their
immediate release from indefinite detention.

More info, Read more and visit: http://london.noborders.org.uk

Serco, the company that runs Yarl’s Wood on behalf of the UK Border
Agency, has tried to brutally repress the hunger strike, most notably
on Monday 8th February when Serco guards locked the hunger strikers in
a corridor for 8 hours without access to water or toilet facilities.

London NoBorders calls for the immediate release of the hunger
strikers and an end to immigration prisons and is calling for a demo
in solidarity with the hungers strikers this Friday at 2.30pm outside
Serco’s offices at 18-22 Hand Court (off High Holborn), London, WC1V
6JF. Please bring banners and instruments.

Defend the Yarl’s Wood 4

nobordersnottm — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:04:23 +0000

Update: Women In Yarl’s Wood Vow To Stay On Hunger Strike – Black Women’s Rape Action Project | 12.02.2010http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/02/445969.html

Women’s struggle ongoing in one of UKBA’s detention centre’s run by Serco scumbags. Moved to mainstream prisons to try and keep them down. How you can help:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/02/445917.html

Written demands:

http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2010/02/report_from_the

Women on hunger strike at Yarl’s Wood centre

nobordersnottm — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 15:49:53 +0000

Women at Yarl’s wood immigration detention centre have been on hunger strike since Friday last week and in the last couple of days, the detention centre has responded brutally. See the links below for info/summary about what’s been happening. The traditional violence of the British state is alive and kicking.

F-word website: Report from the Yarl’s Wood hunger strike: By Jess McCabe | 8 February 2010, 16:54
http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2010/02/report_from_the

See also: National Coalition of Anti-Deportation Campaignshttp://www.ncadc.org.uk/

Hicham Yezza and the new issue of Ceasefire

nobordersnottm — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:03:00 +0000

On August 12th Hicham Yezza was released from HMP High Down after more than 5 months in prison following a year-long ordeal of first being arrested at his workplace University of Nottingham as part of a terrorist scare fiasco, subsequently incarcerated and moved around various detention centres facing immediate deportation but managing to prevent this and to take his case to court in spite of vigorous opposition from the Home Office, then being found guilty of a criminal charge and imprisoned again.

More details about his case and welcome release are forthcoming. In the meantime, his campaign website carries details of the new issue of Ceasefire, the magazine of Nottingham Student Peace Movement he edited whilst at the University. This one is a special 68-page limited edition edited in Cell 213, HMP Canterbury.

Hicham is due to speak at this weekend’s Beyond Borders event in Nottingham.

Action against deportations – get involved!

nobordersnottm — Wed, 20 May 2009 12:05:07 +0000

To find out what you can to help local people facing deportation, visit: http://www.nottsrefugeeforum.org.uk/

There is also an Anti-deportation group that meets regularly – contact No Borders Nottingham for details: Email info (at) nobordersnottingham.org.uk

Visit http://www.nottsrefugeeforum.org.uk/nrcg.htm for news & advice about detention and deportation. For UK-wide anti-deportation information visit National Coalition of Anti-Deportation Campaigns: http://www.ncadc.org.uk/

Latest news, 20th May, 2009:
We have just heard that Sima Valand’s removal directions have been cancelled!
Sima now has a decent solicitor working on her case and the solicitor’s intervention stopped today’s removal. She has submitted fresh evidence which the Home Office are considering so hopefully, Sima won’t be at risk of removal now and can apply for bail. But if you’re poised over the fax machine about to send an appeal on Sima’s behalf to Smith, don’t let this stop you from carrying on!
Sima Valand is desperately fighting to stop the Home Office sending her to India where she is at risk of murder at the hands of her in-laws. She was not flown on Fri 8th May or Wed 20th May. She remains in an immigration prison until she is bailed, to fight and hopefully win her case. More info: http://www.nottsrefugeeforum.org.uk/

Abolish All Immigration Prisons! We mean it.

nobordersnottm — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 09:13:57 +0000

Read an Indymedia round up of recent No Borders actions: No detentions, No deportations! More action to take place on Saturday 21st March (for details, follow link, or just scroll down this blog).

Bedford demo “For An End to Immigration Detention” Sat 21st March

nobordersnottm — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 19:04:05 +0000

Saturday 21st March 2009 Gather 11.30am at Bedford Town Centre to march from Bedford to Yarl’s Wood Detention Centre, to demonstrate between 12.30 and 2pm.

London NoBorders, Campaign Against Immigration Controls, SOAS Detainee Support Group, No-one is Illegal, Campaign To Stop Arbitrary Detention at Yarl’s Wood, Campaign to Close Campsfield, Legal Action for Women, All African Women’s Group and Barbed Wire Britain Network to End Detention call:
For An End to Immigration Detention
Saturday 21st March 2009 Gather 11.30am at Bedford Town Centre to march from Bedford to Yarl’s Wood Detention Centre, to demonstrate between 12.30 and 2pm.
Further details: http://london.noborders.org.uk/yarlswood2009

Letter received from Zimbabwean detainee in Yarl’s Wood

root — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000

This comes from a detainee we have come to know and who anti-deportation activists in Nottingham are supporting. Like many desperate Zimbabweans she came to the UK on Malawian passport. This is not illegal in international law if you are fleeing persecution. She narrowly escaped being removed last week due to a Home Office cock-up, but we can’t rely on another one of those. Please watch this space for more news of how to support her. We don’t want to give her name, but here is her experience?

This comes from a detainee we have come to know and who anti-deportation activists in Nottingham are supporting. Like many desperate Zimbabweans she came to the UK on Malawian passport. This is not illegal in international law if you are fleeing persecution. She narrowly escaped being removed last week due to a Home Office cock-up, but we can’t rely on another one of those. Please watch this space for more news of how to support her. We don’t want to give her name, but here is her experience.

Hello. Im 28 and I am a Zimbabwean national who is at the present moment detained at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre in Clapham, Bedfordshire. I was given a flight date for Tuesday the 6th January 2008 , where I was to be removed to Malawi by force.

In Zimbabwe I was residing in Harare in Warren Park and here in England I was living in Kent since 2004 and I moved to Leeds in 2007 where I was until I was brought to Yarl’s Wood. I have been in detention since the 20th October 2008 and recently I was given a flight to Malawi despite me not being a Malawian and despite the fact that my case was still being heard at the high court.

I will not forget this dreadfull day in my life, the time of the flight was 7pm, but I was told to prepare my luggage and get ready to leave the centre by 12pm and then was transported from the centre to the airport at 2pm. I did not expect to be escorted by 4 people, three of them were huge and hefty men and one was a woman, thats when I knew that this day was going to be difficult one for me as the men had handcuffs and looked like they were prepared for a fight.

We got to the airport around 3:30pm and had to wait in the van out in the cold for some hours until they were ready to force me on the plane. I thought my life was over, one of the men who was in charge of the escort kept asking me if i had contacted my lawyer about the flight or about the injunction from the court to stop the removal order and I assured him that I was not going to board the plane no matter what it took.

I found it to be an unlawfull thing to be removed to a country that I did not belong to because of the passport I was holding, I was protesting all the way to the airport and trying to explain to the escorts that I was a Zimbabwean and that I had enough evidence to prove this and that i had used the passport to flee from my country Zimbabwe, but they turned a blind eye on the matter.

I explined that I had a friend who had been in the same situation as mine and she was also detained at Yarl’s Wood. she was deported to Malawi by force and Malawian Immigration arrested her for “abusing their” passport and she was to be held in custody for a month and then later be deported to Zimbabwe the country she had ran away from. All this happened even though UK Border Agency deny that Zimbabweans deported to Malawi are arrested or detained and are deported to Zimbabwe. My friend phoned me from Zimbabwe and told me of her ordeal in confidence as she is still in hiding.

All this I explained to the escorts and all they said was they were just doing thier job. I was tired, cold and scared all the time I was in the van and I was very disturbed. at 6: 20 pm, I was informed by the leader of the escorts that the flight was cancelled , he gave me a reason that there was something wrong with the booking of the tickets and that I was to be returned to the centre. I cried with joy, my prayers had been answered?.