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  • Hundreds of kilometres south-east of the French mainland you can still find some of the last

  • wild landscapes in the Mediterranean.

  • A stunning spine of rugged, often snow-capped mountains, long winding ribbons of unspoiled,

  • sun drenched coast.

  • It's no wonder they call Corsica the "Isle of Beauty".

  • Corsica's remote terrain has bred a tough, self-reliant community and in the untamed

  • hills and valleys, hunting is a Corsican tradition.

  • Some of these men have hunted together for decades, today they're chasing wild boar.

  • In Corsica the hunt of the wild boar is a custom which has lasted for generations.

  • It allows us to get together, to have a good time and to keep our friendships, because

  • above all, the hunt is about friendship".

  • Hunting is of course hit and miss and while these men will spend the morning without bagging

  • a prize, Corsica remains a renowned destination for hunters from all over Europe.

  • But it's famous for something else as well. The island is the murder capital of Europe,

  • with a homicide rate seven times that of mainland France.

  • "We can no longer count how many people have died. We don't have accurate figures for the

  • number of murders or attempted murders. It's huge".

  • Based in the capital Ajaccio, Paul Ortoli is a crime reporter for Corsica's daily newspaper.

  • Corsica has always had a high

  • murder rate, but Ortoli says that more and more high profile victims are being killed.

  • A sign,

  • he believes, that the criminals think they're untouchable.

  • "The more violent the murder, the greater the impact. The more high-profile figures

  • are murdered, the more we have the feeling that the mafia is powerful".

  • The recent hit list includes some of the island's more powerful figures. Jean-Luc Chiappini,

  • Mayor and National Parks President, gunned down in his car while leaving the airport.

  • Dominique Domarchi, Mayor and Advisor to Corsica's Chief Executive, shot at his front door.

  • Jacques Nacer, President of the South Corsican Chamber of Commerce, assassinated on a main

  • street of Ajaccio.

  • And late last year, the murder in broad daylight of Corsica's most famous lawyer, Antoine Sollacaro.

  • "What you feel at the time is terror - something which stuns and paralyses you at the same time.

  • Like his father, Paul Sollacaro is a defence lawyer. Father and son often worked together

  • in the criminal courts of Corsica and Southern France. Paul Sollacaro is still coming to

  • terms with his father's brutal murder.

  • "You're in shock and it's like living in a bad dream or rather a nightmare. To tell you

  • the truth you can't believe it. You can't believe it".

  • Antoine Sollacaro was killed one morning last October. The lawyer was heading to work in

  • downtown Ajaccio. As usual, he drove from his home via the local garage to buy a newspaper

  • but on that day, a motorbike was tailing him.

  • At the garage, the motorbike passenger jumped off and shot Sollacaro in the head, firing

  • another volley to make sure. It was a professional hit.

  • Crime reporter, Paul Ortolli was on the scene within minutes.

  • "When we realised it was Antoine Sollacaro, we said to ourselves that we'd gone to another level,

  • because Antoine Sollacaro wasn't just a lawyer - he represented the government and the rule of law

  • We wondered how far this spiral of violence would go.

  • We had the impression that anyone could get killed at any time and anywhere".

  • Also on the scene was Corsica's top local politician, Dominique Bucchini

  • "Unfortunately we are the most criminal region in Europe.

  • It's appalling. It affects everyone.

  • That's enough. That's enough. We must be able to live peacefully and with each other's differences".

  • The murder of Antoine Sollacaro sent shockwaves across Corsica and mainland France.

  • "When my father died the violence exploded

  • into the face of French people in all the country, that the violence was there before,

  • every day, and the French people realised Corsica was a very violent place".

  • "So who do you think is responsible for your father's death?"

  • I think the situation we're in in Corsica is serious. It is complicated. We're in a mindset of assassinations,

  • because the criminal world is re-organising the world of organised crime in Corsica

  • Many believe Antoine Sollacaro was the victim of feuding gangs.

  • There were 19 murders last year and now we're up to 14 murders.

  • In Ajaccio the most symbolic and high profile murders are committed - Antoine Sollacaro

  • and Jacques Nacer... "

  • The theory is the criminal lawyer, through his work, had become too close to one faction.

  • "What we can say is that Antoine Sollacaro, as a lawyer, could be thought as close to

  • some criminals and by targeting him, a symbol was being killed and that gang was being targeted".

  • "The death of Sollacaro was clearly a sign that there are currently major tensions

  • between different gangs which are emerging at the moment".

  • Gabriel Culioli is a writer and close observer of Corsica's crime scene.

  • "With the end of the older generation of criminals

  • a younger generation is emerging who cares less about clashing with the state.

  • To get power they're prepared to kill in a much more brutal way than their elders. That's the difference".

  • "Since 2008, organised crime has re-formed. There have been fights between rival gangs

  • over the economic interests of business, control of drugs, control of illegal gambling, gaming

  • rooms in Paris... They are fighting over their share of the pie".

  • The biggest money spinner on Corsica now is land and property.

  • In the tourist playgrounds on Corsica's coastline, the sun, the sand and island charm attract

  • millions of visitors every year - but with the tourists come huge development pressures.

  • Property values have exploded in the last decade and where there's money to be made,

  • you'll find Corsica's criminal gangs.

  • So the underworld - that is, organised crime -

  • is interested in all these places and they're putting pressure so they can eventually monopolise

  • the land, even farming land, and then develop it - with or without the agreement of a certain

  • number of elected officials".

  • The booming property market is also the ideal machine for laundering dirty money.

  • The money is invested in property and it becomes entirely legal.

  • You can't trace it back anywhere. The money becomes legal and becomes part of Corsica's mainstream economy"

  • It's Corsica's mayors who are at the sharp end of the pressure - they have the power

  • to say yes or no to developments. Today a group of officials from the island's north

  • are gathering to talk business and swap stories. Among them is Ange-Pierre Vivoni, a mayor

  • for 20 years. Vivoni thinks the influx of fast money has changed Corsica.

  • "We went from the 20th century to the 21st without a transition.

  • Every continent, every island in the world has had some kind of transition.

  • It didn't happen here. We went from living as peasants to being obsessed by gain".

  • With so much money at stake, being a mayor has become a dangerous job.

  • In the past few yearsa number have been shot dead. Ange-Pierre Vivoni says mayors are under constant pressure

  • to give people what they want.

  • "The threats are pretty simple. Sometimes they want to kill you because you are clearly

  • in the way. We annoy certain people. Then it's phone calls... you never know who's on

  • the end of the line.

  • But if those threats scare you, if those threats make you back down, that's when you've lost

  • the battle".

  • Over the years Mayor Vivoni has survived some close calls - including arson and bombing

  • attempts.

  • "They burnt down my family home. It really hurt me. I felt I was being destroyed within.

  • I felt destroyed. I saw my childhood go up in smoke over three hours

  • although it felt like three centuries. They blew up my cars.

  • There was even one bomb under my car that didn't explode. If that one had exploded, I would have ended up in Italy.

  • What keeps Mayor Vivoni going is love for his country. For centuries his family's home

  • has been here on Cap Corse, the northern tip of the island.

  • "And what we want to do is to protect these wild landscapes, these landscapes which have remained as God made them.

  • If they come here they'll make it into a Cote D'azur

  • and if they did that it would be really catastrophic".

  • It's largely untouched, but not for want of trying. Thanks to his strict zoning laws,

  • horses not hotels, enjoy the sea view. Vivoni takes us to a place once earmarked for 400

  • villas and a huge marina development - a project he blocked.

  • "So this Italian wanted to build here and there on 30 hectares

  • and build a port down there and bring people here from Italy and elsewhere. They wanted

  • to bring 400 or 500 people here. But I didn't want that. For me, it's much prettier like

  • this - nicer than having a marina here and 400 villas, or mini villas".

  • "Were you threatened or were you offered a bribe with this project here?"

  • "He said he'd be able to 'sort it out' with me.

  • That meant we could find some sort of solution. His solution would have been to give me something

  • or other. But regardless Ange-Pierre Vivoni wasn't prepared to make a deal".

  • Back at his office, Mayor Vivoni is concerned about some recent night-time visitors.

  • At 2 am in the morning, the Mayor's neighbour was woken by a strange noise.

  • "... he went out and he saw in front of my window two people... camouflaged, hooded..."

  • The ongoing threats won't weaken Mayor Vivoni's resolve but they've taken a toll on his family.

  • His first wife left him because of the pressure.

  • "But she was the one who felt threatened, when she received phone calls telling her

  • "Tonight your husband won't come back. You'll find him in the morgue." "We'll come, and

  • you and your children will pay for what he says". So of course, a wife and her children

  • are affected by all that. I often came back home to find them barricaded in.

  • It hurts, that kind of thing... because afterwards you wonder if you were right".

  • A long and violent separatist struggle over decades has left a bitter legacy in this untamed

  • island. But even those involved in that deadly conflict are shocked by the scale and brutality

  • of today's many murders.

  • We're heading north to meet some brave locals who've decided to try to do something about

  • the violence. As if on cue, we hear there's been an assassination along our route. It

  • happened right here on the main road.

  • "This is the scene of one of the latest killings here on Corsica. A 22 year old man

  • was found on the road here next to his car with a trauma wound to his head. Initially

  • it was assumed he'd had a car accident, but when they did an autopsy, they found he'd

  • actually been shot in the head, the latest in a long line of victims of Corsican violence".

  • The port town of Bastia is the capital of Corsica's north.

  • Here, the violence has reunited a group of veteran activists. 18 years ago women from

  • across the island united to protest against the violence. They called themselves "Protest

  • for Life". The recent murders have reignited their outrage.

  • "The man two days ago was 22.

  • He was gunned down like a rabbit. When he was on his way home in a car he was shot.

  • Like a rabbit in a hunt.

  • You don't get used to it. You don't get used to death. And yet,

  • after fifteen years we still tell ourselves, we should be used to it. It never stops. There've

  • been hundreds of deaths over the last fifteen years. And most haven't been solved".

  • Back in the late 1990s these women organised street marches and lobbied politicians. French

  • leaders seemed to be listening, and promised to take Corsica's problems seriously but spokeswoman

  • Paule Persie thinks nothing has changed.

  • "Do we have to take to the street once more to say we've had enough?

  • Fifteen years of saying 'enough'. Well, that's enough! Something else is needed. We need action

  • But just two days later, a few hundred metres down the road, Corsica's violent reality strikes again

  • "We've just been told there's been a double murder here in Bastia in the centre of the

  • town just a short distance from our hotel. So ah,