Original source: solidaritytodecember8.wordpress.com (Russian, Czech, French, Polish and Spanish translations available)

On Tuesday, December 8, 2020, 9 comrades were arrested by the DGSI, the French anti-terrorist police unit, across France. In Toulouse, in Dordogne, in the Paris region, in Brittany, and in Rennes. Anarchists are accused of being the criminal association planning a terrorist attack. All but one comrade was released, some after months in pre-trial detention. They are awaiting trial and are placed under the judicial control. The defendants, not all of whom know each other, have been under surveillance for a long period of time, including digital surveillance such as planting recording devices in vehicles as well as physical surveillance.

Libre Flot has been writing to us regularly for the past year since the beginning of his incarceration in the Bois-d’Arcy Prison isolation ward (you can find several of his letters on our website). On December 8, 2020, he was arrested with seven other members of the ultra-left movement for criminal association in connection with a terrorist enterprise (here is the website of the supporters of the defendants in this case) as part of yet another attempt by the police and the justice system to make enemies and terrorize potential opponents.

Seven people were finally indicted and placed in pre-trial detention. Over several months, six of them were eventually released under judicial supervision. As he has just been refused release while awaiting trial, Libre Flot, the last person still imprisoned, is on a hunger strike. He asked to have this letter published today as widely as possible, to make his reasons and his situation more widely known.

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For more than 14 months I have been refuting this infamous and defamatory accusation of association with terrorists.

It has been more than 14 months since the DGSI explained to me that I was not arrested for what they wanted me to believe, namely my involvement with the Kurdish forces against IS (Islamic State) in Rojava.

It has been more than 14 months that nothing has backed up the accusations fabricated by the DGSI, even though for at least 10 months I have been followed, traced, and bugged 24 hours a day in my vehicle, my home, spied on even in my bed.

For more than 14 months I have understood that it is my political opinions and my participation in the Kurdish YPG forces in the fight against IS that they are trying to criminalize.

It has been more than 14 months that 7 people who do not know each other are accused of criminal association.

It has been more than 14 months of being interrogated by the investigating judge using the same tortuous techniques as the DGSI: manipulation, decontextualization, omission and invention of words and facts in an attempt to influence the answers.

For more than 14 months I have been subjected to the provocations of this same investigating judge who, while I have been languishing in the jails of the Republic, allows himself to tell me that this case is a waste of his time in the fight against terrorism. Worse still, he allows himself the most unacceptable insult by referring to the barbarians of the Islamic State as my friends from IS. Although verbal, this is an unheard of act of violence. It is inadmissible that this judge grants himself the right to insult me to the highest degree, tries to smear me, and spits on the memory of my Kurdish, Arab, Assyrian, Turkmen, Armenian, Turkish and international friends and comrades who have fallen in the struggle against this organization. I am still outraged by this.

It has been more than 14 months of a biased investigation in which, contrary to his role, the investigating judge investigates only for the prosecution and never for the defense. He does not take into consideration anything that falls outside of the alleged scenario and only serves to validate a made-up personality fabricated from start to finish by the DGSI, which far from representing me only reflects the paranoid fantasies of this political police. Thus, I am constantly presented as a charismatic leader even though any non-horizontal mode of functioning is contrary to my egalitarian values.

For more than 14 months I have been held in so-called pre-trial detention without trial, under the most terrible conditions possible: the regime of isolation (see letters of March 2021 and June 2021) considered by several human rights bodies as psychological torture and inhuman or degrading treatment.

It’s been more than 14 months that I’ve been buried alive in a hellish and permanent solitude without having anyone to talk to, only able to contemplate the decay of my intellectual capacities and the degradation of my physical state, all without having access to psychological support.

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After having provided the prison administration with false arguments to ensure that I would be kept in solitary confinement, the investigating judge requested the rejection of my request for release, as did the national anti-terrorist prosecutor. To do this, they practically copy and pasted the DGSI report of February 7, 2020, the basis of this whole affair, whose accuracy has not been demonstrated and which we do not know where the information comes from. We have the right to ask ourselves what was the point of the wiretaps, surveillance, sound recordings and these two years of judicial investigation and inquest, since the facts that demonstrate the false allegations of the DGSI are hidden.

The National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office and the investigating judge are constantly trying to cause confusion and to create a connection with Islamist terrorists, even though they know full well that I fought against the Islamic State, notably during the liberation of Raqqa, where the attacks of November 13 were planned.

The investigating judge claims to be afraid that I would inform imaginary people of my situation, even though it is public, notably because the DGSI or the PNAT themselves have leaked the information from the first day. He thus claims to prevent any pressure on witnesses, victims and their families even though there are no witnesses or victims since there is no act. It is grotesque. He also mentioned his fear of a concerted effort between co-defendants and accomplices, even though all the co-defendants have been released, he has not questioned anyone but me since October 2021, and that I have waited patiently until he has finished questioning me to file this request for release.

It could have been comical in other circumstances to note the use of harmless facts such as: enjoying my right to move freely in France and in Europe, my lifestyle, my political opinions, my sports practices, my taste for rap music or Kurdish music.

The examining magistrate attacks my mother by designating her as not being a valid guarantor for the simple reason that she did not prevent her son, who was 33 years old at the time, from joining the Kurdish forces of the YPG in the fight against IS. Once again, it is my participation in this conflict that is being criminalized. He also criticizes the use of encrypted applications (WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram…) as do millions of people in France. Finally, he denigrates all the other options of guarantees (work, accommodation…) without having anything to reproach them even though the staff of the SPIP, whose job it is, have given a favorable opinion.

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How can we understand that after having ordered feasibility investigations indicating the possibility of releasing me subject to tagging, the judge of freedoms and detention, in spite of the report, refused to put it in place? Many of us have noticed that in this whole affair, the bodies of justice violate their own laws and are subject to the political agenda of the DGSI.

I recently learned, directly from the mouth of the director of detentions of the Yvelines prison (Bois d’Arcy), whom I thank for his frankness, that my placement and my maintenance in solitary confinement were decided from the first day by very high ranking people and that whatever I say or he says or does, nothing will be done about it, that it is beyond him, the file will not even be read and I will remain in solitary confinement and that in any case nothing could change before the presidential elections.

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Since they are trying to criminalize the activists who fought with the Kurds against IS,

Since the so-called pre-trial detention is used in order to punish political opinions,

Since this story exists only for the purpose of political manipulation,

Since today I am only left with the prospect of the slow destruction of my being,

I declare myself on hunger strike since Sunday, February 27, 2022 at 6 p.m. At this time, I only ask for my release while waiting to show the slanderous side of this shameful accusation.