Monday 6 August 2012

Police Use Force to Evict Activist

Early in the morning, police vans parked all around the building where E. lives. She has been struggling with her living place, where they did not recognize her right to tenancy because she divorced from the person who originally was living there. Despite the fact that she continued to live there alone for 22 years, paying rent, they notified her that they wanted to evict her. E. went on rent strike. In the fall, an attempt to evict her was blocked. In the meanwhile, she tried to get social housing from the city. She is a qualified, low-income person, but the city does not care about it. Despite the fact that eviction onto the street is against the constitution and she was offered no place to stay by the city, the authorities decided to use force to carry out this eviction.

About 50 police forcefully removed a group of about 40 blockers. Half of the people on the blockade were senior citizens, some of whom could not defend themselves against the police and most of the blockers were women. More police were waiting for action, including some anti-riot police. E. fainted during the police action and had to be taken to the hospital. She is OK now - at least physically.
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