We were happy to be a part of a Europe-wide resistance against the fascist Pegida network and the racist Fortress Europe on 6th of February. Scandinavia is typically notoriously absent in these Europe-wide action days which make us lose out on being a part of creating international resistance and a common internationalist movement. For us, being a part of the action day as such and crossing borders to act together with our Danish comrades and in solidarity with European antifascists and revolutionaries everywhere is an important step forward and a success in itself. The struggle against capital, nationalism and patriarchy is an international one and this has never been more true than these days of racist border controls and fascist mobilization.
In Scandinavia the image of the “humanist”, “tolerant” and even “socialist” (!) states is now badly marred by the actions of our governments. Sweden has imposed border controls which has both de facto abolished the right to asylum as well as causing huge problems for tens of thousands of daily commuters across the Öresund bridge. In Denmark the right-wing government has gone so far as to sanction the expropriation of migrants’ belongings (such as jewelry) in order to “pay” for their “stay.”
In Sweden and Denmark Pegida remains a fringe phenomenon. The Swedes appear to have been utterly unable to stage a protest alongside their fellow fascist chapters in Europe. In Denmark Pegida, also known as For Frihed (“For Freedom”), has gathered the same group of 30-70 oddballs, racists and outright neo-Nazis in Copenhagen every Monday for months in 2015 and now once every month in 2016. They did manage to boost their numbers for the 6th, joined by a Danish author and a British “mosque buster.”
The antiracist response to the Pegida march has lacked greater numbers and on the 6th we were a total of 120 activists. There are many theories to why we mobilize so few, but our Danish comrades in No Pegida and Revolutionary Antifascists have worked tirelessly to counter Pegida’s Monday marches for months, week in and week out which is a fact which they should be highly commended for. On the 6th there was an impressive blockade attempt in front of Danish parliament, constant harassment of Pegida supporters and several reported confrontations with Pegida supporters which were positive developments in a situation with as many police (also ca 120) as protestors. These actions made the police gradually lose control and move from a more passive approach at the start to violent outbursts at the end of the demonstration (where overzealous police officers were held back by their colleagues). These small and important successes aside we must, however, realize that our movement is weak at the moment and try to move beyond this fact. It is important that we discuss and evaluate this process openly. We have taken important steps to constructing a regional and international movement, but these are only the baby steps in a much larger development which requires us to better communicate, mobilize and struggle both in order to meet fascist groups and the racism inherent in the state but also in order to create a society without classes, abolish patriarchy and once and for all extinguish racism.
We would finally like to thank all the comrades from Denmark for their organizing work, our comrades from Sweden for joining in on our trip and send our greetings to everyone struggling together against fascism and Fortress Europe on 6th of February.
Organising Autonomously,
07/02/16