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France

Conviction upheld in Corsica murder trial

A Paris court upheld on Monday the conviction and life sentence given to Corsican separatist, Yvan Colonna, for the murder of a local police chief, at the end of the second appeal in a long-running case.

AFP PHOTO / MEHDI FEDOUACH
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Yvan Colonna's lawyers immediately announced that they intend to appeal again.

The defence team argue that the investigation into the killing of police prefect Claude Erignac in 1998, was faulty.

Colonna yelled "I am innocent!" as he left the dock. 

He was named as the man who pulled the trigger by fellow members of his armed separatist group, who later retracted the charge - one of them then claimed that he himself had been the killer.

Claude Erignac was killed by three bullets to the head on a street in Ajaccio, in a rare political assassination on French soil.

Colonna was arrested in 2003 after four years on the run, after first being convicted in 2007.

A police prefect is appointed to every region in France, as the most senior representative of the French state.

 

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