And You Thought Mexico Is Bad....

[deleted.]

PARIS -- French secret agents foiled a bid by Islamic militants to kidnap contestants in the Paris-Dakar rally earlier this month as they raced across the Sahara desert state of Mali, the Defense Ministry said on Thursday.

A spokesman said the DGSE foreign intelligence service had played a key role in preventing what the Le Point weekly news magazine said on Thursday was a plot by a 100-strong gang to attack participants in the rally.

The 10th and 11th stages of the 11,000 km race were scrapped due to the security alert.

"French intelligence had information which led us, with our colleagues in Mali...to take decisions which you have been able to read about in the press," a Defense Ministry spokesman said.

Le Point, whose details the ministry declined to confirm or deny, said Defense Minister Michele Marie-Alliot discussed the threat during a trip to Mali's capital Bamako in December.

It said the French-backed operation had prevented leading French driver Stephane Peterhansel and Spanish motorcyclist Nani Roma from falling into the Islamists' hands.

Le Point said the group, heavily armed with machineguns mounted on their all-terrain vehicles, had intended to kidnap the pair in Mali's southern Sokolo region on Jan. 10.

The magazine said the group had fled north once they realized the ambush scheme had been discovered.

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[01_el_tiburon]

What do you mean you thought Mexico was bad ....? Dont get it, have you been kidnapped in Mexico or ambushed ?

omar

[RanchoRacer1600]

i agree, whats with this mexico is bad thing????seriously you need to think, everyone over there in paris and dakar and whatever is in between are unpleased cause the cars run through what land they have left....here in mexico it gives them a brake, more people = more money for them...so i think its BS that you said we thought mexico was bad

[deleted.]

Hey I meant no disrespect toward 99% of the spectators down there, just the 1% who enjoy ruining someones race by building booby traps etc and giving the country a bad name.... Newayz i could have named the post differently and I am truly sorry if i have offended anyone who may have understood it a different way than it was intended to be understood.

[Vtr_Racing]

Yes we have been ambushed down there! We were robbed at gunpoint on the way back from La Paz back in 90 or 91 I believe. We were with the 5/1600 Rasta Racing crew of Vince Alcoumbre and got pulled over by what we thought were police a few miles past the border between baja norte and baja sur. One guy had some kind of automatic weapon and the other guy had a pistol. They were looking for money and drugs and all us had our money hidden very well in the transport van. They got kinda upset and shot out our left side tires.
This, in my opinion was a rare incident and I still love going down there. I have made many many trips down there without a problem. It could have happened in the US just as well so I dont consider it an issue but it does happen.....

[RanchoRacer1600]

ya ok ok...mexico is bad but the stuff they do is sorta what makes this sport interesting..the terrain is bad enough as it is, and they make the smooth spots rough by building booby traps. its good that you apologized for the name but my bad ifi got on your case bout it.....but man, that really happened to you? how did you get back to the US?--to el_tribun