Workshop for Anti-fascist Actions — on December 14, 2024
Translated by Bogdan Osincev
They hang large and green in the advertising display cases at streetcar and bus stops in Berlin’s city center: handmade posters from Workshop for Anti-fascist Actions (German: Werkstatt für antifaschistische Aktionen) show a slightly edited version of the well-known symbol for emergency exits. The person running out of the emergency exit has dropped a broken rifle and a steel helmet behind them, representing a conscientious objector. WAR RESISTERS WELCOME is written in capital letters above the image.
Kai N. Krieger, Workshop for Anti-fascist Actions
With our campaign, we are drawing attention to the fact that conscientious objectors from Ukraine, Belarus and Russia face high barriers to staying in Germany. We absolutely must support people who do not want to take part in killing in war. We are in favor of asylum for conscientious objectors! Especially in times of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, it is more important than ever to offer people who refuse military service a place of refuge. Without soldiers, Putin cannot wage war. But for more people to refuse military service, they need a safe perspective, a place of refuge and asylum, for example in Germany.
However, contrary to grandiose claims, the German government prefers to get rid of refugees from Russia and Belarus as quickly as possible. It has only recognized just under 100 Russian deserters, refusers and draft dodgers. “Scandalously few!” — Kai N. Krieger.
The action is part of the #ObjectWarCampaign organized by Connection e.V., which works with and offers support to conscious refusers and deserters internationally. On 14 December, Connection e.V. organized a demonstration against war and for refugee protection in front of the Federal Migration Office in Nuremberg, as well as an online petition calling on the European Parliament and the European Commission to take action to protect conscious refusers and to support solidarity projects with political refugees from Belarus.
These posters are a form of creative protest, involving taking over advertising windows in public places and using them to spread political statements. But not everyone likes it: although the Berlin prosecutor’s office believes that it is perfectly legal to hang your own posters, in recent years repressive measures have repeatedly been taken against people who do so, which have even led to several house searches. However, after a lawsuit was filed, the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe eventually ruled that the searches were completely disproportionate to what had been done and illegal.
Kai N. Krieger
We believe that such an action is an excellent way to make our demands for asylum for willful refusers known. How can we say that we are against war and related human rights violations if we do not give other people the opportunity to avoid military service? That’s a double standard! Besides, dictators like Putin will look very foolish when the people he wanted to destroy at the front gradually disperse.
One thing is clear to the organizers of the action: if everyone has the right to live in peace, then everyone should have the opportunity to exercise this right.