"we should all be smugglers"
illustration Accompanying a text comparing the utility, effectiveness and subversive potential of smuggling services and stationary activist support in the Bosnian-Croatian border area.
"Especially since the PoM are involuntarily holding out in the Bosnian border area, it would make more sense for solidarity structures to make their resources available for “taxi rides”, as this would support the PoM’s wish to move to central/western Europe. This would allow PoM to reach their destination more quickly and often, if all the resources of all parties involved are included in this hypothetical calculation, it could also save money.
Unfortunately, due to the criminalization of assisting illegalized border crossings and other legal hurdles, this is structurally not possible and would mean the end of most organized support structures and criminal prosecution of the activists involved. The decision in favor of material support in the Bosnian border area and against active help to cross the EU border therefore seems logical and strategically correct to uphold some support structure and avoid imprisonment. Nonetheless, the smugglers basically provide more effective support and do de facto more for the practical implementation of freedom of movement for all."
outsourcing the militarization of the eu border into academia
border business
on professionalisation of solidarity and activist burnout
"GErmany on Border Patrol"
Illustration accompanying a text investigating the joint patrolling of the german polsih border by both states
"Since last fall, border protection in the EU has been strengthened even where there are no visible borders anymore – in the Schengen area. [...] In September 2021, Horst Seehofer, the German Federal Minister of the Interior during this time, announced these joint police patrols on Polish territory. Subsequently, at least eight units with hundred of federal police were sent to the German-Polish border to strengthen identity checks in the border area. These targeted patrols are intended to shield Germany without closing the Schengen internal border between Germany and Poland."
"For the chance to apply for asylum in their “destination country”, the official registration in Poland is also a danger. [...] according to the Dublin III Regulation, only the country in which the first fingerprints and biometric data were recorded in the Eurodac database is responsible for the asylum procedure. Regularly, protection seekers are deported from Germany to the country of first entry. Protection seekers have to “go underground” to move on without registration. This “secondary movement” is increasingly monitored by intra-European states. Thus, Germany can benefit from operational police patrols on Polish territory, as protection seekers are controlled before they cross the border, and the responsibility for the asylum procedure is left to Poland as their agreement partner.
