NYU Occupation Forcibly Ended by Security
The occupation of an NYU building by students was ended violently a couple days ago by security forces on the orders of the administration who cowardly refused to engage with the students. See below for links to info about the occupation. In international solidarity with the New School occupation a month ago, and the directly democratic actions in Greece, France, Italy, and India, students in Finland occupied the University of Helsinki on the same day as the NYU occupation (see below for their initial statement).
(links from Onto on anarchist.academics)
timeline:
http://www.nyunews.com/news/university/kimmel_a_timeline-1.1488287
background:
http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2009/02/103597.html
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/19/nyu-cafeteria-occupation-continues/?scp=3&sq=nyu&st=cse
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/20/nyregion/20nyu.html?scp=4&sq=nyu&st=cse
other:
photos:
http://blogs.nyunews.com/category/lockin/kimmelphoto/
On the same day students in Finland occupied the University of Helsinki:
Below is the statement from Helsinki. (thanks to Garnet for sending me this)
=========================
Solidarity from the University of Helsinki to the occupants at NYU
Today on Thursday, February the 19th, we occupied the administration
building of our university.
This took place after our demonstration against the new Universities Act
proposed by the Finnish government. The parliament will decide about the law
this Spring. We demand the law to be withdrawn. We want to reform our
university from a totally different, more democratic perspective.
We are also protesting against the university leadership which has given its
support to the law despite our opposition.
The law we are opposing would significantly increase the influence
corporations have on our university and thus our science. We are defending
the autonomy of knowledge and the freedom of research. We are also defending
the free access to higher education as stated in the Finnish Constitution.
We are not defending our university as it is, we want to create autonomous
spaces for producing and sharing information.
Our demonstration today was participated by 1500 people. It was organised
autonomously by students and university staff, independently of their
unions. After the demonstration, a group of more than 100 demonstrators
occupied this building. Today we have made our voices heard and we will keep
doing so until we win!
We want to send you our solidarity. We share your struggle!
Opiskelijatoiminta
http://opiskelijatoiminta.net
