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Emmanuel Macron, this Thursday, April 4, 2019, in Cozzano (Corse-du-Sud) for the last great national debate. Ludovic MARIN / AFP

Emmanuel Macron chose the village of Cozzano in Corsica as the last leg of his tour of the regions in 80 days as part of the great debate. The French president came to meet local Corsican elected officials, a region endowed with a certain autonomy but still struggling with a strong independentist demand. A file that dominated the exchanges of this great debate. Nationalist leaders Gilles Simeoni Island and Jean-Guy Talamoni had decided to boycott the meeting, but Emmanuel Macron took the opportunity to respond to their criticism.

With our special correspondent in Cozzano, Valérie Gas

It is an elected official The Republic in March (LREM), Jean-Baptiste Luccioni, the mayor of Pietrosella, who was the mouthpiece of the Corsicans who regretted the words of Emmanuel Macron during the tribute to prefect Erignac in 2018 in Ajaccio. " I had a bad experience of your first presidential visit because there were words that helped to not build the road to peace, " he said.

But no question for Emmanuel Macron to give up anything on the conviction of this crime. On the contrary, the president believes that those who defend the Corsican identity must do a memorial job. " As long as in this part of history some will not have the courage to say it is a plague and that the suffering of the family Erignac is also ours, they will stammer history, " replied the head of the 'State.

LIVE | Great debate with elected officials Corse.https: //t.co/kfVnpCeODf

Elysée (@Elysee) April 4, 2019

A remote response to the attacks of the nationalist leaders of the island, Gilles Simeoni and Jean-Guy Talamoni , absent from the debate, to which he sends a message. " I do not want to fall into the trap of posture. I think the Corsicans deserve better than trench warfare, he said. Corsicans, they need concrete solutions for life to improve. "

Emmanuel Macron said he wanted to move forward with the Corsicans and recalled that he accepted the inclusion of Corsican specificity in the Constitution. " The recognition of this specificity, which is a path to the possibility of adapting norms within the framework of its competences, is called autonomy in the Republic, but I never said that I was for autonomy without the Republic, "he said. Once again Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed the framework in which he was ready to negotiate.

► To (re) read: France: Emmanuel Macron completes the great national debate in Corsica