Rocket and riots in strife-torn Corsica
Youths throwing stones and shooting flare guns clashed with police, and an apparent rocket attack razed a docked French customs boat in Corsica – the latest violence on the Mediterranean island swept up in wave of labour strife.
The skirmishes capped about a week of unrest on the picturesque French island triggered by government plans to privatise a state-run ferry operator. Earlier yesterday, riot police evicted union pickets who had blockaded a Corsican port for four days.
The strikes at ports in Corsica and the city of Marseille on the French mainland spread to the island’s airports on Friday. Authorites said about 15,000 tourists were stranded, though Saturday’s police raid in the Ajaccio port was expected to free up some ferry traffic.
“Once again, tourists get taken hostage,” said Patricia Berthet, 68, who was on vacation from northern France. “We were told to take a pane, but what do we do with our cars? We are not going to leave them to these Corsican jerks.”
The workers’ protests began after the government announced its privatisation plans for the SNCM ferry operator on Monday, and have blended with Corsica’s long-simmering independence movement mostly involving low-level violence by organised crime gangs and separatists.
Late yesterday, a huge explosion echoed through the port in the northern town of Bastia as an apparent rocket attack left a large hole near the helm of the customs boat.
No one was injured in the explosion that left behind a smouldering wreckage of the 82-foot boat, while police set up a security barrier at the site to keep back reporters and other onlookers.
Tensions had mounted as at least 2,000 protesters swarmed into Bastia streets yesterday afternoon, with a contingent of 500 police on hand to keep order.
The march marked the first time that unions had come together in a united protest on the island in 15 years, and organisers said at least 9,000 people took part.
At the end of the mostly peaceful march, riot police guarding a government office building fired tear gas at about 50 youths who had pelted the officers with firecrackers, stones and flares. One officer was hospitalised with severe head injuries, officials said.
Street signs were seen torn out of the ground, and the windows on at least 15 parked cars were broken after the mélee began.
Hours earlier in the western port of Ajaccio, police backed by a helicopter and armoured vehicles removed trucks, trailers and about 10 striking workers who had blocked access to the only cargo vessel in the port, police officials said. No injuries were reported.
The police action allowed ferry traffic to resume after the four-day hiatus, and about 600 tourists left the island by the first boat to arrive since the port was blockaded.
The protests spread beyond Corsica – and more than just maritime workers took part. Firefighters in Corsica temporarily walked off the job in support of the unionists. Ajaccio’s professional soccer match at home against Lens on Sunday was called off amid the turmoil.
In the south-eastern French city of Marseille yesterday, police stormed two oil terminals that had been blockaded since Monday, opening them up to provide crude oil to refineries, officials said.
Earlier this week, striking unionists commandeered an SNCM ferry before police commandos stormed the vessel Wednesday, took control and steered it back toward France.
Assailants fired a rocket at a municipal office building in Ajaccio on Thursday evening, causing a blast felt several blocks away and damaging the building. President Jacques Chirac condemned the attack.
Pierre-Rene Lemas, the top federal official in Corsica, said some stocks of medicines and blood would run out by Monday evening if ferry routes did not resume quickly.
