'Wine terrorists' challenge Sarkozy

Militant vintners...who knew? It's hard to copy and paste when you're shaking with laughter, but here goes.

A shadowy group of wine activists has issued a one-month ultimatum to Nicolas Sarkozy threatening "action" if the new president fails to help the industry.

The Regional Committee for Viticultural Action (CRAV) has been known to hijack tankers of foreign wine and dynamite government buildings or supermarkets.

In a pre-recorded message delivered to France 3, a regional television channel, from "somewhere in the Languedoc hinterland", five balaclava-clad men read out a statement addressed to the new president.

Looking more like Corsican nationalists or masked Islamic fundamentalists than winemakers, the "wine terrorists" vowed that if nothing changed and the price they received for their wine had not gone up, they would go "into action".

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While nobody will own up to being a member, it is an open secret that the CRAV is the armed wing of winemakers' unions of the Languedoc and Roussillon, the highest producing wine region in the world. In France, and the Languedoc-Roussillon in particular, production far outweighs demand.

The wine making industry in France has an armed wing? I believe that's number 8 on the Top 10 signs your group may be a terrorist organization.