linksunten Archiv

In the days before the eviction signboards were put up, that forbid parking in front of Liebig 14. In a wider radius, neighbours decided voluntarely not to parc their car in the kiez and better be brought home with a taxi. It created a weird calm that was cut by helicopters passing by, humming police cars and crashing glas-bottles. In severe coldness any people decided to stay in the streets during all the night before the eviction. Sometimes there was live music that smoothend our nerves on the edge. Some people try to limber up at the bakery. Many just wanted to be there without knowing exactly how to contribute actively in the awful spectacle coming up. Wait? – Or take the time by the forelock with a walk through the neighbourhood? Those, who are outside, have all of the time and all of Berlin. For those, who are inside the Liebig 14, the juridically appointed deadline gets closer, 8 o'clock, and there is still work to be done at the Barricades.

 till 5h

All over Berlin there is movement of heavy police cars reported. Cops start to controll people, constrain them in their freedom of movement and send people off. They allready film a lot and have their attack dogs free in Rigaerstraße. Special forces position themselves in climbing gear on the roofs of the surrounding Hauses. But the people in the streets won't watch it happen deedlessly. On several corners of the city loud groups join together, there are first attempts to build barricades at the street and there is a report of a new house, that got squatted in Mühlenstraße near Ostbahnhof.

5-6h

Between 5 and 6 there happened a lot: One Transpi of Liebig 14 caught fire, because someone weldet metal to finish the Barricades at the balcony. Soon it turns out that the fire won't spread at the facade, but die away slowly.
Cops increasingly close off the area around Liebig 14. Via Forkenbeckparc there was the possibility to get a little closer for some time. Press, medics and neighbours are not allowed to get close any more but are pushed back to Bersarinplatz. The people inside the backery are still closed in. Cops jace around people in the district and there are arrests. There are reports of a Sparkasse in Prenzlauerberg that got taken apart exhaustively and that a new house got squatted, Landsberger 77.

6-7h

Cops continue to close off the area and let not even press and medics pass. They start to tamper with the roof of the Liebig 14. On the anti-eviction-ticker there are messages sent about two more banks that got dismantled: one sparkasse and one commerzbank. Quite busy in regards to the early morning hours.

7-8h

At 7.17 the people inside Liebig 14 sent out greetings via twitter.
There was an announces manifestation at Rigaerstr 84, street blockades, spontanious demos and severals reports of cops peeing around.
The lawyer of Liebig 14 and the heads of the Liebig 14 association were prevented from getting close to their house or making contact to the coward of a bailiff. They could have proven, that there are no appropriate eviction titles against the people inside the Liebig 14 and that the eviction must not take place for that reason.
The eviction was appointed for 8 o'clock, but it was before 8 that it started. The cops began 10 mins before to breake into a window at the ground floor with their axes.
Press was kept away in far distance, their sight blocked with big laterally parced police cars.

8-9h

Plenty of cops now enter Liebig 14 through the window in the front. At the backside as well they broke open access to the ground floor and enter the house from there.
Spontaneous demos all around the area and in a cat- and-mouse-game with the police actions of various kinds – blockades or damage to property – take place as well as some arrests by civil cops.
At all balconies, at all windows there are neighbours making noise with pots and pans and shouting chants of solidarity.
Soon it turns out that the police gets stuck in the ground floor. They don't manage to get through a barricade between ground floor and first floor.

9-10h

After failig to get through a barricade at the groundfloor, police makes another attempt to get into Liebig 14. They try to build a ricketly scaffold to enter through the first floor. Soon they have to realize that it will not work out and they unbuild their construction.
In the meantime there are more and more loud and powerful movements of people at the street. In many places traffic is blocked. Cops want to pee in the backery 2000, because neighbours complained about them peeing around. But they are not lucky with the backery either and get kicked out.
Within the Liebig 14 electricity and water got cut off between 9 and 10 o'clock. The exhausted inhabitants sit together in their kitchen and make their usual pizza at the gas stove.

10-11h

The noise of pots and pans continues. Again and again people shout their chants of solidarity. Within the Liebig 14 police tries to make their way by knocking down walls. Outside on the streets there is really a lot going on. People get ketteled, the EA talks about 14 arrests. In Wedding people can do their work with less disturbance.

11-12h

From 11 on there is a registered demo at Prenzlauer Allee, where a lot of people take part in. Others are still moving around in small groups, they protest, blockade and they are loud. There is a fire attack to the Berlin railroad. Neighbours provide delicious food to the freezing people in the streets. The police is still up to mischief as the "critical lawyers" will later publish in their conscious report.
Suspecting that there would be a bomb at the attic of Liebig 14, the eviction stagnated for a while. First the police needed to make sure with chemical tests what these strange colourful liquids were, which theiy found in several bathtubs. Then the eviction continues.
The inhabitants know, that there are not so many more walls between them and the police. Even when all the barricade-art stayed intact, they just digged their way into the house wall by wall.
The inhabitants step on the balcony of the third floor together, wave flags and are wildely cheered up by neighbours. Not so far away from their balcony some cops stick out their wretched faces from some windows of the 14. They have to watch the scene like that.

12-13h

During the time, where there is still a lot going on in the streets, the live in Liebig is getting closer to it's end. At half past 12 the police manages to get through to the inhabitants of the 14. They find them sitting in their kitchen. The inhabitants have allready heard the invaders knock so many times. They want to see the papers, the legal basis for the eviction. This creates confusion among the cops there. Finally even the coward of a bailiff showes up and has to comitt, that there are no appropriate titels for the eviction. Never the less the inhabitants get moved out, one after the other, some with violence, some not.
In this hour also the PrisonSupport arrives at Tempelhofer Damm. They have tee and food with them and get ready for a long day there.

13-14h

After the last inhabitants of Liebig 14 were taken out, a mob of press people were let in. Axel Springer was happy for the whole following week to publish intimate details of the mysterious »squatters«. – What was written on the walls, which animals suposedly lived in our matrazzes and which brand of pasta we ate.
One uplifting news arrives from Neue Bahnhofsstraße, where a new house got squatted. According to the ticker this must have been the third house of the day. At Alexanderplatz, Clowns are busy in the Galeria Kaufhof, where they try to find new appartments. More and more news arrives about soliactions from ourside of Berlin. In this hour there are ticker-messages about actions in Göttingen.

14-15h

At the streets the cat-and-mouse-game continues. All the decentralized actions seem to trouble the police. Short in inspiration they look for a stable target ot their attacks, the Kreuziger 18, a house projekt, where police from dresden intrudes violantly. People get injured.
The Clowns at Alexanderplatz are ketteled by police vans.

15-16h

In Kreuzigerstraße there is still stress with the police. They harrass people and pee around. A Solidemo starts off at Herrfurthplatz and there is news about the fourth squatting of the day, this time in Körthenerstraße in Kreuzberg. »Liebig 14 bleibt!« is what the banners there say and it seems as if Liebig 14 did not die on this day, but expand.

16-17h

The demo in Neukölln is powerful and releases at it's end 600-700 loud people into the streets. A fifth house gets squatted. Meanwhile a private security company guards Liebig14.
There are calls to even more decentralized actions in uncommon districts of the city.

17-18h

In this hour there are solidemos in Freiburg, Osnabrück and Kopenhagen. Berlin still does not calm down. For security reasons the police guards construction sites now.
There are estimated 40 arrests so far.

18h-end

In the evening, it was time to find collective strenght and take the streets together. In Saarbrücken and Düsseldorf there are further solidemos. For Berlin, there is as well a big demo announced and police does illegal ID-checks on great scale. The demo starts to move, it's rageous and loud. That a lot of stuff is going to be dismantled this evening is commonly known. At one point the collective presence turns into decentralized actions and the rest belongs to history.