On this blog you can find current articles, actions and campaigns from the Refugees Movement around Oranielplatz in Berlin.
The suicide of Mohammed Rahsepar on 29.01.2012, who as a refugee was housed in collective accommodation under inhumane conditions and could no longer stand it, triggered protests across Europe that continue to this day. In 2012, several hundred refugees gathered in Würzburg and walked to Berlin to draw attention to the intolerable crimes of European politics against people seeking help. In Berlin, they set up a protest camp at Oranienplatz – also called Oplatz – and occupied an empty school in Kreuzberg, the Gerhard Hauptmann School. Several more protests followed, culminating in hunger and thirst strikes. The demands are still directed against compulsory residence, against accommodation in camps and against deportations. The Berlin Senate and the districts react – just like the FRG and Europe as a whole – with violence and deportation of activists. In the spring of 2014, the camp at Oplatz was cleared under false promises of the Berlin Senate, and some refugee activists were even persuaded to tear down the camp themselves – a contact point for many stranded refugees, a place of common resistance and exchange. Since then, Oplatz has not only been a sympbol for self-empowerment and solidarity, but also continues to be a point of reference for joint organizing and protest.