Freedom Of Movement in association with Bristol Antifa and Bristol Anarchist Black Cross are pleased to present an evening of punk and ska featuring

La Fraction (France)
Left For Dead (Kent)
Jakal (London)
Rejected (Bristol / Wales)

at The Croft, 117-119 Stokes Croft, Bristol BS1 3RW. 7-11pm, £6 entry, early arrival definitely recommended.

This event is raising money for the family of Ivan 'Bonecrusher' Khutorskoy, a Russian anti-fascist who was brutally murdered by nazis in November last year.

Ivan was a genuine hero, a committed fighter for the anti-fascist cause who paid the ultimate price for his beliefs. His attitude remains an inspiration to those of us who continue the struggle against the fascist threat. We are proud to hold this event in his memory and hope that you can join us too.

If you are unable to attend the gig, you can still make a donation for Ivan's family via Bristol Antifa (please make sure you state that the donation is for Ivan).

Who: Active Minds, Tortyr, This System Kills, Cry Havoc, Jesus Bruiser and Murder Of Crows
Where: The White Hart, Whitehall Road, Easton BS5 9BJ
When: Saturday 23rd January 2010, 6pm(ish) – midnight(ish)
How much: £6

Punks from near and far join forces in Bristol this Saturday night to raise money for worthy causes (including Antifa, Hunt Saboteurs and Sea Shepherd). Six bands over six hours for six quid, and held in a welcoming local pub, it's a must for lovers of noisy music, friendly crowds, cheap cider and a damned good night out!

16th March 2003. 26-year-old Italian anti-fascist Davide Cesare is stabbed to death by fascists after leaving a bar in Rome.

13th November 2005. 20-year-old Russian anti-fascist Timur Kacharava is murdered by fascists in St Petersburg after a Food Not Bombs action.

16th April 2006. 19-year-old Russian anti-fascist Alexander Ryuchin is stabbed in the heart by fascists on his way to a concert.

21st July 2007. 21-year-old Russian anti-fascist Ilya Borodaenko is attacked by fascists during the night at a protest camp and dies from head injuries.

12th November 2007. 16-year-old Spanish anti-fascist Carlos Javier Palomino is stabbed in the heart by fascists while on his way to a demonstration in Madrid.

18th January 2008. 18-year-old Czech anti-fascist Jan Kučera is stabbed to death after confronting a knife-wielding fascist.

16th November 2009. 26-year-old Russian anti-fascist Ivan Khutorskoy is shot to death by fascists at the entrance to his home.

Today, on Sunday 17th January 2010, Bristol and Czech anti-fascists gathered beneath the Spanish Civil War memorial in Castle Park to honour these fallen comrades. Like others before them, they have paid the ultimate price for their beliefs. We will never forget the debt we owe to every one of these men and women who gave their lives in defence of freedom.

But we do no justice to these heroes simply with words and monuments. While the cancer of fascism threatens, we will continue to attack and destroy it. And we will not stop until the disease is eradicated.

Even as we remember and mourn our losses, we resolve to fight harder for all of our futures. Our message to the fascists is simple and defiant -

YOU SHALL NOT PASS!

(Report in Czech here)

In recent months, the English Defence League have appeared on the streets of Britain. The group claim to be opposed to Islamic fundamentalism and, on the surface at least, try to sound like a reasonable and respectable response to the religious fanatics of Islam4UK and their kind.

Scratch beneath the surface though, and it soon becomes clear that the EDL is nothing more than a right-wing nationalist organisation intent on stirring up racial tensions and divisions in the UK. They state that they're only against "Muslim extremism" and deny being racist, hoping to deflect criticism and gain wider appeal. But their tactics clearly echo those of right-wing and fascist groups; using provocative rallies and marches, scapegoats (Muslims this time) and rhetoric based on fear and hatred.

"Like the BNP, the EDL will not solve working class problems"

While the EDL leadership tries hard to publicly distance itself from the fascist British National Party, it can't hide the fact that the group was co-founded by BNP members and activists. Nazi-saluting BNP thugs and right-wing football hooligans shouting racist abuse on EDL demos have shown their true colours. With chants of "dirty Muslim bastards" and "We hate Pakis more than you", EDL members are singing from the same hymn sheet as fascist bigots everywhere. Their right-wing mobs serve to further the aims of the "respectable" BNP and to provide it with new recruits and more votes. By stirring up trouble between Asians and whites in local communities the EDL have taken nationalist politics back to the street.

Like the BNP, the EDL have grown in the face of a political culture dominated by middle class values meeting middle class needs. The mainstream parties have never looked after working class interests, we've been abandoned by most of the "radical" left and traditional trade unions have largely lost the will to fight. It comes as no real surprise that a disempowered and pissed off chunk of the white working class, looking for a target for their anger and a voice that speaks for them, turn to the likes of the EDL.

And, like the BNP, the EDL will not solve working class problems. Its demands back up right-wing media hysteria and strengthen calls for ever more repressive government powers to 'deal' with militant Islam. We've seen how so-called anti-terrorist laws are used against us all, to keep us under control. For the authoritarian state, the EDL is a gift. They divert our attention away from targeting the real enemies of the working class – the bosses, bankers and politicians – and distract us from organising for ourselves, as a class, to fight for control of our lives and communities.

The EDL and the religious lunatics they claim to oppose have far more in common with each other than they do with the rest of us. They are all small-minded bigots with a hatred for the traditional working class values of freedom, fairness and equality. Their racial, religious and cultural 'identity' politics are in complete opposition to our idea of a world where we can all reach our full and unique potential, and we reject them totally.

This article is also available as a downloadable A5 leaflet for printing and distribution in your neighbourhood.

Recommended further reading:

Multiculturalism & identity politics – the reactionary consequences and how they can be challenged (IWCA)

Received today from Liverpool Antifascists:

It would seem that the Freepost Against Fascism campaign has been successful. From the BNP website:

"Please be aware that our FREEPOST address is no longer operational due to sustained abuse and illegal activity from our political opponents. This matter is currently under police investigation and until further notice we would request that you use the following postal address instead" etc. etc.

No doubt the police investigation will fail to materialise, unlike the slew of desperate, begging letters from Gri££in!

RESULT! Thanks to our friends everwhere for spreading the word, taking part and making this happen.

Received from a friendly anti-fascist postie:

Bankrupt the BNP!

Well, maybe not quite bankrupt, but folks in the UK can help make this bunch of fascists considerably poorer.

They've just got themselves a freepost address:

British Heritage FREEPOST

Nice and easy to remember eh? Every 'letter' to this address costs them 42p, and can simply be an empty envelope with the address on it. It's cheap to buy a bunch of these (you can get 50 self-seal ones for 75p from Wilkos) and run them through your printer while you're off doing far more interesting things. A friend has so far sent 1250 envelopes, costing the fash over 500 quid. That's less than £20 of my mate's hard-earned cash very well spent!

Please feel free to join in.

42p may not sound like much, but it would pay for dozens of BNP leaflets. Multiply that by potentially tens of thousands of empty envelopes sent their way and the impact on their activities becomes much more obvious. And when an envelope costs little more than a penny, it really does make sound economic sense!

We're advised that it's not worth sending heavy objects as they'll be filtered out at the sorting office, and we don't want to make our posties' jobs even harder than they already are.

Clive Courtney (right), one-time darling of local nazis and failed fascist candidate in every election he's ever contested in the South West, appears to have disappeared off of the BNP radar. This seems strange for someone who recently bragged to us that

My position in the BNP is team Leader for the Dept. of Security in the South West. I attend most national and local events – Leeds Trial, RWB, organisers' conferences, election counts, demonstrations and so on. My background in security work, close protection, TA and martial arts – which I teach – serves me well in this role. We have quarterly training camps in all aspects of security and the party now has an Intelligence Dept. which is a separate entity to the DoS, for obvious reasons.

Now we think we've found out why there's been a deafening silence in the BNP's propaganda machine about this nasty drivel-spewing piece of work.

A few months back, we reported the arrest of Courtney for assaulting his partner. We've since discovered on the 'This Is Bath' website (05.08.09) that:

Clive Courtney, 55, of St John's Court, Keynsham, was given a community order for two counts of assault by beating.

This is the same 'man' who told us back in January that

My stepdaughter, by the way, thinks she disagrees with the BNP but that is the result of PC brainwashing from TV and her multi-culti teachers at school (so bear that in mind if you decide to do something heroic like put our windows in while our two babies are sleeping – it will prove me right to her about my reasoning regarding all you cowardly lefty/liberal/self-loathing dupes of the establishment).

We don't need to say any more.

Once again the farcical exercise of elections has rolled past us, and once again the various political parties have put great effort into persuading us to validate their overflowing bank accounts in return for their continued interference in our lives. The parties attempt this, as always, by highlighting the crimes and errors of their rivals while being guilty of the same incompetence and corruption themselves. Different elections, same old shite.

Perhaps what made this time different was the worrying situation that some people were seemingly so sick of the cash-grabbing antics of the larger parties (as if any of the smaller parties would be any different!), that they threw their lot in with the likes of UKIP and the BNP in what has laughably been dubbed as a 'protest' vote.

The end result of this has been BNP Führer Nick Griffin and fellow former National Front 'elite' Andrew Brons representing parts of England in Europe. Something which the bullshit merchants of the BNP are now making a great song and dance about, despite the fact that the pot-bellied pair actually received less votes than when the election circus was last in town. The BNP knew that getting just one person elected would give them a level of exposure that money can't buy, such is the mainstream media's desire to feed them the oxygen of publicity they so badly crave.

However, for our very own local BNP scumbags things did not go according to plan (some things never change). The desperate begging, or in some cases the abject indifference, of the eight BNP candidates that were put forward resulted in very little. The most 'impressive' outcome being Michael Carey, who stood in the St George East ward and will no doubt rave about receiving 17% of the vote, although in reality this equates to total count of just 575 and was even lower than the last time. Still it's better than his chum Christine Ogden, who stood in Horfield, and came dead last with 3% or a 'staggering' 135 votes.

Obviously any support for fascist lunatics, no matter how minor, is cause for concern and opposition. Perhaps for the time being we can take some comfort in the fact that Bristolians continually refuse to swallow BNP lies, although it’s a fair bet that this refusal was aided by the very public revelation, a few days before the election, that local BNP head honcho (at least in his own imagination) and public relations nightmare Clive Courtney may well have a taste for domestic violence.

The resounding lesson of this episode, and what we need to convey to those within our communities who felt desperate enough to foolishly support this sham of a political organisation, is that there is no such thing as a so-called protest vote. Put simply, a vote for a fascist organisation is a vote for fascism.

From last Friday's Bristol Evening Post:

A British National Party activist who has run for council and to be an MP was arrested on suspicion of assaulting his deaf wife.

Clive Courtney, 55, was yesterday being questioned by Avon and Somerset police for alleged violence against his spouse, Julie, at their home in Pensford.

Mr Courtney has been a local organiser of the right-wing party for Bristol and has been active during the current local election campaigns.

A police spokesman told the Bristol Evening Post: "I can confirm that last night, at about 11.25pm, we were called to a disturbance at a Hillcrest address in Pensford.

"Subsequently, a 55-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of assault and is being questioned at Bath police station."

It is thought construction engineer Mr Courtney's teenage step-daughter was also at home during the alleged assault on Wednesday night. As of yesterday evening, he had not been charged with any offence.

The BNP are normally extremely quick to publicly counter what they perceive to be 'media bias' against them, particularly when it involves senior figures like Courtney. To the best of our knowledge, they have not yet responded to this article.

We sincerely hope that Courtney has not assaulted his wife. We unconditionally condemn domestic violence, in any form. But, if he has assaulted his partner, and his stepdaughter witnessed it, then it makes the email we recently received from him all the more despicable.

After confirming that it was, indeed, him in the photos we took in Bedminster a few months back, he went on to say:

My stepdaughter, by the way, thinks she disagrees with the BNP but that is the result of PC brainwashing from TV and her multi-culti teachers at school (so bear that in mind if you decide to do something heroic like put our windows in while our two babies are sleeping – it will prove me right to her about my reasoning regarding all you cowardly lefty/liberal/self-loathing dupes of the establishment).

Courtney's stepdaughter has nothing to fear from anti-fascists. She is obviously an intelligent young person who understands perfectly what the BNP stands for and rejects it wholeheartedly, which comes as no surprise seeing as she's living under Courtney's roof.

Bristol Antifa aren't in the habit of harming innocent people. That's why we fight fascism.

We've received this report from Hereford Solidarity League, publishers of the excellent 'Hereford Heckler', on fascist activity in their area. They've also adapted our anti-BNP election leaflet for mass distribution around the town, and are busy countering the fascists' lies on the street and in the media. Good work!

Christopher Gower (Supreme Leader of Hereford BNP) and his ragtag bunch of numpties

Hereford Solidarity League (HSL) has been busy organising against and exposing racism and fascism in rural Herefordshire for almost two years. Through their bimonthly news sheet the Hereford Heckler, they have been making life very uncomfortable for the local British National Party.

The recent behaviour of the Hereford BNP numpties has been particularly sickening. The murder of a local teenager in March was seized on in an attempt to stir up anti-eastern European feelings. The two men arrested for the murder are Lithuanian nationals, but that didn’t stop the BNP from calling on all Polish people to be kicked out of Hereford!

Unfortunately for the clueless fash, Hereford is a small town and word gets around. People immediately contacted HSL to let them know what was going on and where the BNP were organising. A quick phone call to the Hereford Farmers Club (right, tel: 01432 272247) confirmed that the venue was being used by the aforementioned numpties. An article followed in the Heckler calling for members to boycott the club. The chairman of the Farmers Club was interviewed by BBC local radio where he predictably claimed that they had no idea that the BNP were meeting there. He went on to say that they are a non-political club and there is nothing stopping the BNP meeting there in future. A spokesperson for HSL, also speaking on BBC Hereford & Worcester, warned that everything will be done to stop fascist groups organising in Hereford and hoped that the Farmers Club would see sense and stop allowing the BNP to use their premises.

At present the Farmers Club haven’t commented further, but HSL are determined to stop the BNP meeting anywhere in the city.