The Noborder action camp that has been running for one week, with creative actions, demonstrations and workshops has effectivly been declared illegal after a demonstration march this afternoon in the city centre was met with tear gas, pepper spray, batton charge and unconfirmed reports of plastic bullets.

The legal teams confirms 30 arretsts and 12 people missing as of 10pm strasbourg time.

As people returned from the protest they were met by the others from the camp with water and medical treatment, as others took vehicles into the centre of town to look for injured people.

Initial reports tell of confusion and much tear gas, there are also reports of one or more banks having their windows broken and also some other businesses - although the timing of this unclear it seems the first clashes occured around people spraypainting of slogans on buildings, just as yesterdays small scuffle with police when they used pepper spray was triggered by someone using pink chalk to write on a statue in the main square.

For reports on the demo see :
 http://uk.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=36762&group=webcast

The atmosphere in the camp was quickly one of concern both for those inured and arrested, and for the overall security of the camp, where there are children on site. There has been concern since yesterdays papers ran with stories depicting the Nonorder camp participants as violent extreemists. As we write meetings in the camp are still going on to decide what should now happen. A press release is being prepared, which should assert peoples rights to communicate, move freely and demonstrate.

The camp is now calm, it seems all police liasion has been cut off, and as stated we have heard the news that all protests regarding the Noborder campaign is now illegal. What will happen we do not know, but the irony is unavoidable - that an action camp around the freedom of movement and communication is now forbidden from communicating with the rest of the city where it has been based.

Previously today a theatrical action was held outside of the militarised bunker which holds the SIS database (schengen information systaem database) that logs details of immigrants and now even only suspected political protestors in europe. A hole was dug in the ground next to the security fence and fake cables attached to a laptop - the cops really thought a security breach had occured and at first tried to smash the computer...
see  http://zone.noborder.org/pics/research_sis/ for reports and pictures.

For freedom of movement and freedom of communication,
Strasbourg Noborder Action Camp
24th July 2002

For updates keep checking the newswire, the uk world page ( http://uk.indymedia.org/index.php3?resist=global), indymedia global, other indymedias including Italy, Germany and Spain etc and the noborder sites.

For info on the SIS and other repressive systems, legislation and policies see  http://www.statewatch.org