Poet Climber Ascends U.S. Embassy in Paris
A self-styled "poet climber" on Thursday managed to sidestep security, climb on to a roof adjacent to the U.S. embassy building in Paris and spend two hours there before being helped down by fire fighters.
Herve Couasnon, whose previous stunts have included sneaking into France's National Assembly and a nuclear power station, told Agence France Presse by phone from the roof that he wanted to meet Barack Obama, give the president his CV and talk peace -- a reference to Obama's ongoing Middle East trip.
Emergency services established a security cordon around the embassy and readied a safety net for fear the eccentric bus driver might fall or jump from his position, straddled over metal railings on the edge of the roof.
Fire fighters used a ladder to reach him in his precarious situation and he came down without resistance.
Embassy spokesman Mitchell Moss denied the incident had exposed lax security.
"This is not considered a breach of either embassy security or embassy property," Moss told AFP.
"He was never on embassy property, he was on an adjacent building separated from our embassy roof by a fence which he never crossed.
"There are two fences up there - a smaller fence that separates the buildings and a taller barbed wire fence that is actually on our roof. He never crossed on to our roof.
"It was a situation that was dealt with very professionally by the French emergency services."
In 2002, Couasnon made headlines after making his way into the National Assembly as then prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin was speaking. He was able to present the premier with a sports trophy before stewards ushered him out.
The 54-year-old, from Perigueux in southwestern France, claims to have scaled the U.S. embassy once before, during the 1991 Gulf war.
Source: Agence France Presse
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