A British War monument in France was vandalized but this article points out that the photo came from a British tourist? Is this an argument that France only reacted when British indignation pointed out the crime or does it mean nothing in itself?

Chirac Apologizes

What needs to be done more than words to rectify this?

I would venture to say it doesn't necessarily mean anything. Despite the target of the vandalism, the crime was nothing more than that. I don't see anything wrong with just cleaning it up the way any other graffiti would be cleaned up in the city. I feel the French likely didn't want to exacerbate the rift between the French and English government at this time and felt it both unnecessary and undesirable to report the incident. Since news of it leaked anyway, certainly a formal apology was in order. Whether they cleaned it up and kept the incident quiet or issued a formal apology after the publicity of the incident, the goal of the French was the same -- to prevent any further rifts in government relations.

As to the second question, I'm not sure what anybody could expect beyond words. It isn't as though Chirac or administration officials were out there defacing the cemetary. I think the formal apology and a good scrubbing is all that's necessary.

Disgusting. Horrible. How awful. I don't even have any words to express my emotions on that.

well....that wouldn't be filtered out by AD anyway

ALJ is right though. Not much you can do. Apologize, then scrub it off. I don't see how they're gonna track down the culprits. (wish they could though)

--cheers

Graffiti like that serves a very important purpose. It proves that even the dumbest members of the population can at least arrange letters in the semblance of a word or two.

And yeah, nothing to do. Clean it up, be thankful the population can still read, and move on.

It doesn't mean anything. The French probably love their graffitti as much as the Italians (a lot). It never occured to them to clean it up until someone became offended.

ok. Maybe I missed something here. What about the Italians and graffiti? Just interested, since I am 100% Italian.

I'm Italian, too! I lived there for a few years, near an airbase. It is pretty common to see graffitti defacing memorials, inside tunnels, ect. The gypsies also use it to mark secret codes... You won't see it on houses or private property, they take great care of their communities, but the graffitti that IS there usually stays.

There was a recycling bin near my house with a huge penis sprayed on it. It stayed throughout my child's speech developement. First, he would point and say "wee wee", later "wee wee there", eventually "mommy, why is there a picture of a penis on the trash can?"