Bomb at Corsican police barracks

The bombing is the worst since the 1999 truce

A bomb has exploded at a paramilitary police barracks on the French island of Corsica injuring 14 people.

The injured were having lunch when the bomb, left outside the barracks, blew a 10-metre hole in a room next door.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the attack, in the village of Borgo, 20km south of the northern town of Bastia.

But earlier this year the Corsican National Liberation Front said it carried out a series of bomb attacks on police buildings.

BBC correspondent Robert Parsons says the latest bombing was the worst in Corsica since the front declared a truce in December 1999.

Explosions, kidnappings and political murders were once commonplace as separatists fought a violent campaign to break away from mainland France.

But the violence has eased since the government of Prime Minister Lionel Jospin began talks aimed at resolving the island's future. It is currently introducing legislation aimed at defusing the conflict.

This will ensure, among other things, that all schools on the island offer classes in Corsican. But the Front says the proposals do not go far enough.