Cautious Welcome In Corsica For Paris' Autonomy Offer

Paris could offer Corsica "autonomy" to calm tensions between the Mediterranean island's fierce independence movement and the French state, a key minister said Wednesday, but local leaders said actions must follow the promises

Ajaccio, France, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 16th Mar, 2022 ) :Paris could offer Corsica "autonomy" to calm tensions between the Mediterranean island's fierce independence movement and the French state, a key minister said Wednesday, but local leaders said actions must follow the promises.

"We are ready to go as far as autonomy. There you go, the word has been said," Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told regional newspaper Corse Matin as he embarked on a two-day visit following days of sometimes violent protests.

With President Emmanuel Macron seeking re-election next month, the offer from France's "top cop" will fall under especially close scrutiny from voters and rivals.

"We'll have to talk about" what form a new Paris-Corsica relationship would take, Darmanin told news channel BFM, warning that "the talks will necessarily be long, necessarily be difficult".

Whatever the result, Corsica's "future is fully within the French republic," he added.

Darmanin also said that "there can be no dialogue while violence is going on. A return to calm is an indispensable condition".

The interior minister's visit follows repeated outbreaks of violence at demonstrations over a savage prison attack on Yvan Colonna, one of a group who assassinated Paris' top official on the island, prefect Claude Erignac, in 1998.

Prosecutors said some 102 people were injured on Sunday alone, 77 of them police officers, during clashes in Corsica's second-largest city Bastia.