French Island Attacked [really]

upi via bloomberg no url | 5/28/4

[NativeNewYorker]

PARIS, May 28 (UPI) -- A missile, struck the home of a gendarme and his family in southern Corsica early Friday and a businessman was found slain in Bonifacio.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the missile attack, and no injuries were reported. French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin vowed to hunt down those responsible.

Violence is no stranger to France's Mediterranean island, where nationalist extremists are engaged in a low-level conflict for independence, and where mafia-style politics is a rarely discussed fact of life.

The body of businessman Antoine Cantara, 65, was found with a bullet in the head, French TV reported.

Once a close associate of Corsican nationalist leader Francois Santoni, Cantara had been targeted in a previous assassination attempt in 2003.

[Mister Baredog]

What time did France surrender?????

[Mister Baredog]

What time did France surrender?????

[Semper Paratus]

Surrender negotiations will start as soon as somebody takes credit.

[Mister Baredog]

Sorry for the hiccup!

[Atlantic Friend]

It's rather usual in Corsica. The FLNC terrorist movement has been attacking French officials buildings and law-enforcement troops for more than 30 years. Here they fired a RPG to a house lodging a gendarme.

[lormand]

Doh! Too late to first issue a "surrender" comment.

[Gator113]

"Minister Dominique de Villepin vowed to hunt down those responsible"......... and present them with a white flag!!

[Sloth]

France will leave no cheek unturned.

[rhc2000]

Hmmmm...who to root for???

[Kozak]

The problem is they don't know who to surrender to.

[Malesherbes]

Notice that the "excessively exuberant" Dominique de Villepin, having ruined France's relations both with the United States and Eastern Europe, is now in charge of internal security - and things begin to explode.

[Billthedrill]

Hmm...the Corsicans aren't exactly pussycats. Aside from that feller named Bonaparte they have a very active nationalist movement and a particularly nasty Mafia.

[Valin]

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the missile attack, and no injuries were reported. French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin vowed to hunt down those responsible. And ask their forgiveness before surrendering.

[Hammerhead]

France attacks itself and Spain surrendurs.

getting weirder by the year.

[firebrand]

ping

[Atlantic Friend]

Yep. The Corsican Maffia is still very active - and has largely bought the independentist movements, especially those who resort to terrorist acts. It's a bit of a Columbian situation, where the drug lords have enlisted the former Marxist insurgents as their watchdogs.

[Atlantic Friend]

Tell you what, if the Corsicans off him, I will raise my glass to his memory - and (because I'm an evil Frenchman) ask fo clemency to be shown to the assassin.

[bmwcyle]

Did someone miss a bribe?

[Bahbah]

"French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin vowed to hunt down those responsible."

Shades of Bill Clinton.