A French secret service agent was killed by militiamen last week at a checkpoint in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, it emerged today.
France never releases operational details about its foreign intelligence service and announced the death only after Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie had attended the dead man's funeral.
"On November 21, a non-commissioned officer of the DGSE [General Directorate for External Security] was killed by a local militia during an inspection at a checkpoint in Basra in southern Iraq," the foreign ministry said.
It gave no further details of the incident. Le Pointmagazine reported on its Web site that a second agent was seriously wounded in the attack and flown back to France on Saturday.
The magazine said the men were in Iraq to protect French diplomats. France, which fiercely opposed the US-led invasion of Iraq, has an embassy in Baghdad and a diplomatic mission in Basra.