The Corsican National Liberation Front (FLNC) claimed responsibility, on Monday October 9, for around twenty explosions on Sunday night against second homes, villas under construction and even a former tax center throughout the island.

In a short message of demand sent to the daily Corse-Matin, the FNLC justifies these attacks by saying it does not have “a common destiny with France” and concludes the message in Corsica as follows: “A Francia fora” [“France outside” ]. In signature, the respective slogans of the FLNC-Union of Combatants and the FLNC October 22, two formerly rival clandestine movements.

The attacks took place, almost simultaneously, between 10:30 p.m. and 10:45 p.m., in villages around Ajaccio – Bastelicaccia, Tavaco, Vico, Villanova, Vignanello – according to the Ajaccio prosecutor’s office cited Agence France-Presse (AFP). From a source close to the matter, referring to “another blue night”, another explosion targeted the old Ajaccio tax center at 11:40 p.m.

In Haute-Corse, five housing estates under construction were also targeted by explosions, south of Bastia, in Lucciana, in Cap Corse, in Erbalunga, and in the eastern plain, in Santa-Lucia-di-Moriani, detailed at AFP another source close to the matter. Again no injuries were reported. An investigation was opened for destruction by dangerous means and transport of explosives, entrusted jointly to the gendarmerie research section and the judicial police.

The National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office (PNAT) announced on Monday that it had opened an investigation. This concerns the twenty-two explosions and the claim by the FLNC, and was opened in particular for “participation in a terrorist criminal association with a view to preparing destruction by explosive or incendiary substances likely to result in death and an act of terrorism, destruction by dangerous means for people in an organized gang and in relation to a terrorist enterprise as well as attempted assassination in relation to a terrorist enterprise,” detailed the prosecution.

Increase in arson and explosions

For almost two years, Corsica has experienced an increase in arson attacks and explosions mainly targeting second homes, most often accompanied by nationalist tags. These actions were claimed, some by the FLNC, on the other hand the GCC (Ghjuventù clandestina corsa), an underground Corsican youth movement.

In a press release at the beginning of August, in which it claimed responsibility for 16 attacks, including 11 in 2023 and five in 2022 and 2021, the FLNC called for the creation of a “patriotic resistance platform” in the face of “a colonization of disproportionate population” and a “process of destruction of the Corsican people”. To illustrate this “patriotic resistance”, the clandestine movement spoke in particular of a real estate agent who “will put the file of a patriot on the top of the pile”, the “employers who will favor a Corsican candidate”, the Corsican who “will prefer sell their land to a young couple from their village” or those who “will work to find another source of income rather than renting their property via Airbnb in a frantic and exaggerated manner”.

According to a judicial source, in August fifty investigations “related to arson or acts of destruction of various kinds” in Corsica had been opened by the PNAT since the start of the year. There were twenty-two in 2022, three in 2021 and four in 2020. The anti-terrorism unit of the Paris court was responsible, on the same date, for fourteen judicial investigations linked to Corsican terrorism, she said.

The last “blue night” of this kind dates back to the night of March 9 to 10, 2019, facts for which the two main defendants were sentenced to six years in prison in April 2022 by the Paris judicial court. That night, fires or explosions seriously damaged seven homes in Corse-du-Sud and Haute-Corse. Even without a claim, the prosecutor then judged “the terrorist dimension” of the facts “fully characterized”.