The minister of the Interior condemns the violence of recent days in support of Yvan Colonna and calls for a “return to calm without delay”.
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Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin will travel to Corsica on Wednesday March 16 and Thursday March 17 to “open” a “discussion cycle” with “all the elected officials and living forces of the island”, he announced Monday in a press release sent to AFP. The government has “heard the requests of the elected representatives of Corsica on the institutional, economic, social or cultural future” of Corsica, adds the Minister, condemning the violence of recent days and calling for a “return to calm without delay”.
The demonstration in support of Yvan Colonna on Sunday in Bastia turned to “the riot”, according to the Bastia prosecutor, with a final toll of 67 injured including 44 members of the police. The slogan “Statu Francese Assassinu”, taken up by the thousands of participants – 7,000 according to the authorities, 12,000 according to the organizers – reflected the tension on the island since the attack on March 2 of the convicted former shepherd. for the assassination of the prefect Claude Erignac.
The day after this attack on Yvan Colonna in Arles prison (Bouches-du-Rhône), which plunged him into a coma, rallies took place all over the island, against a background of questions about the conditions of this attack targeting this Corsican independence activist who had long demanded his reconciliation in a prison on the island.
On Friday, Prime Minister Jean Castex tried to calm the situation by announcing the lifting of the status of “particularly guarded detainee” (DPS) of Pierre Alessandri and Alain Ferrandi, two other members of the “Erignac commando” still detained on the continent. It is this status that blocked the rapprochement of the three men in a Corsican prison.