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Gunpowder, threatening letter sent to lawmaker on day before marriage vote

Gunpowder, threatening letter sent to lawmaker on day before marriage vote

PARIS — The speaker of France’s National Assembly on Monday received an envelope filled with gunpowder and a threatening letter calling on him to delay Tuesday’s planned vote on a bill to legalize same-sex marriage.

Claude BartoloneSource

The letter to Claude Bartolone, president of the lower house, arrived just one day before the National Assembly is scheduled to conduct the final vote on the marriage bill that would allow same-sex couples to marry and adopt children, reported The Local.

The one-page letter, signed by “an intermediary of law enforcement,” warns Bartolone that “our methods are more radical and more swift than protests.”

“Allowing marriage for all would be the same as destroying all marriage,” the letter says, before making the chilling threat: “If you were to carry on regardless, your political family will have to suffer physically.”

“Our methods are more radical and direct than demonstrations,” the letter concludes. “You wanted war, you’ve got it.”

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Opposition to the marriage equality bill has become increasingly fierce in recent weeks.

On Sunday, tens of thousands of demonstrators took to Paris boulevards to protest the bill’s expected passage this week — one protestor called marriage equality “a threat to the social fabric.”

Gay rights activists claim that homophobic acts have tripled nationwide over opposition to the marriage equality law.

Over the weekend, another gay man was attacked and beaten unconscious in the latest anti-gay attack in France. Raphaël Leclerc said he was punched and kicked after being jumped by three men when he and his boyfriend left a night club in the Mediterranean city of Nice.

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