French tourists may be billed if high-risk trips go wrong

French tourists who run into trouble after taking unnecessary risks overseas could have to pay for their rescue and repatriation under legislation debated yesterday by MPs in Paris. The proposed law, put forward by a government tired of having to foot the bill, would enable the state to demand reimbursement for "all or part of the costs … of foreign rescue operations" if it deems that travellers had ventured knowingly and without "legitimate motive" into risky territory.

According to the foreign ministry, the bill is an attempt to encourage a "culture of responsibility" among French travellers at a time of frequent kidnappings, hijackings and civil instability across the world. The ministry hopes that the prospect of being saddled with paying costs such as emergency air fares home will make people think twice about venturing into territory classified as dangerous. There is no question of ransoms being included in the cost, unsurprisingly, as France insists it never pays them. Several French-led overseas missions in recent years have sparked debate over who should shoulder the financial burden for holidays gone drastically wrong.



Last year, several French yachts were hijacked by pirates off Somalia, with one of the commando raids culminating in a man, Florent Lemacon, being killed. Officials expressed exasperation that the sailors had been warned repeatedly of the region's dangers but sailed on nonetheless. It is unclear which, if any, of these rescue operations would have been affected by the legislation, which applies to "people who have deliberately exposed themselves, without a legitimate motive stemming from their professional situation or a situation of emergency, to risks of which they could not have been unaware".

But the government insists that neither journalists nor aid workers would be affected by the law, which would be applied "case by case". "Obviously journalists who take risks are protected … They are excluded, aid workers too," said Bernard Kouchner, the foreign minister and co-founder of Médecins sans Frontières. Similar steps have been taken by other countries, including Germany, where last year a court ruled that a German backpacker taken hostage in Colombia in 2003 should pay €12,000 (£10,775) to cover the cost of her helicopter rescue.