With a larger police operation, the left-wing autonomous car camp “Köpi” in Berlin-Mitte is to be evacuated on Friday. The residents on the approximately 2,600 square meter property and their supporters have announced resistance and have already registered for the early morning rallies.

The car camp on a site on Köpenicker Strasse is considered to be one of the last symbolic projects of the left-wing scene in Berlin. The owner successfully sued for eviction in June with reference to a building permit. The Berlin Court of Justice rejected an urgent application by the residents to stop the foreclosure on Wednesday.

The police cordoned off the area surrounding the project. For their part, the residents have additionally secured the fence around the site in the past few days. One will not give up without a fight, it was said last week.

According to the police, riots broke out in the Kreuzberg district on Friday night. Strangers smashed car windows in Ritterstrasse and threw paint bags on houses. In a demonstration with several hundred people on Thursday, a policewoman was also slightly injured. Garbage cans were therefore burning in Stresemannstrasse.

Hundreds of supporters of the “Köpi” in Mitte and Friedrichshain protested against the eviction last weekend. In the past few nights, garbage cans and tires were set on fire in the area several times. On Wednesday morning strangers damaged the glazing of the entrance doors at the Bürgeramt in Berlin-Mitte and sprayed “Köpi remains” on the building.

“Köpi” also includes a large rear building, which is not to be cleared. The building on the strip of the Wall in East Berlin was occupied in 1990, the year after the fall of the Berlin Wall. In addition to apartments on the upper floors, there is a concert room, a climbing wall, a small sports hall and a cinema in the basement and the lower floors. According to the residents’ association, around 30 people live on the adjacent property with old construction trailers.

How the situation will develop upon evacuation can hardly be predicted. The resistance to the evacuation of the occupied house “Liebig 34” in Friedrichshain in October 2020 was much smaller than on similar occasions before. During a fire protection test in the partially occupied house “Rigaer 94” in June, however, there was a violent attack on the police.

© dpa-infocom, dpa: 211015-99-602797 / 2