Around 4 p.m. yesterday there was an assault on a manifestation that was held on Mynttorget [translator’s note: a square between the Swedish Parliament and the Royal Palace] in Stockholm in support of unaccompanied youth’s right to asylum. It was about twenty Nazis organized in Nordic Youth [Nordisk Ungdom] (NU) that went to joint attack with smoke bomb, banner and slogans. The Nazis tried to abort an ongoing speech by shouting among other things “Incarcerate – Deport!”, “Out with the rabble” and “Muhammed, Abdullah – Go away!”. The police that arrived to the location made the decision to not turn away the Nazis, but referred them to a place a little bit away at Mynttorget where they could continue to disturb the manifestation.
Yesterday’s attack has certain similarities to the attack that Nazis from the Nordic Resistance Movement [Nordiska Motståndsrörelsen] (NMR) performed on an anti-racist demo in Kärrtorp 2013. Then as now it was organized Nazis that chose to go to physical attack against an anti-racist manifestation and then as now the police chose to use the soft gloves instead of the rough gloves against the organized Nazis. The anti-racists present chose to stick together and keep the initiative, which lead to the Nazis not being able to do anything but shove and shout. That nobody was injured during yesterday’s attack is largely due to the group NU consisting of a bunch of thrill-seeking Internet-warriors that mostly perform actions to be able to snap spectacular pictures for their homepage.
This occurred on the same day as it in media emerged information that Falun municipality had chosen to evacuate 50 people from a refugee housing for two days due to the threat model against the housing in connection to NMR marching through the city on May 1. Time after time society’s respresentatives choose to take a clear stance for the Nazis’ right to take room on our streets, even when that means that other people are threatened. In the name of free speech one defends the Nazis’ interests and thereby infringe on large groups of society’s right to move safely within their own city, or as in Falun to remain residing in one’s residence.
Nazi organizations constantly try to get their adherents to take the step away from the keyboard and onto the street. We that for decades have fought the Nazi movement know from experience that it is a fatal mistake to give these groups free access to our cities. The only principle that in practice prevents Nazi groups from recruiting and growing is to never leave them in peace. It must be difficult, scary and associated with great discomfort to claim the street for spreading of Nazi hate and directly or indirectly threatening the life of individuals from large groups of society.
That is why we always hit back, that is why we will never let the Nazis gain ground, that is why we claim that anti-fascism is self-defense.
/AFA Stockholm [antifa Stockholm]
Translated by b9AcE (https://soc.ialis.me/@b9AcE and https://twitter.com/b9AcE) to the best of my ability, from the original text in Swedish. Any errors are to be presumed mine, not antifa’s.