¡ATENTADO ECOLÓGICO, atentado ecológico! Mirad, chicos de Greenpeace, lo que hace Chirac:

The most direct route from Paris to Moscow by aircraft is to fly due east. Unless you are President Chirac, that is.

The French premier likes his sleep so much that, en route to a Black Sea summit with President Putin and Chancellor Schröder, he had his flight diverted by 1,200 miles so that he could have a long sleep.

Le Canard Enchainé, France's version of Private Eye, tells a tale this week headlined "Chirac's sleep is priceless".

On August 31, Chirac was due to fly from Paris to the Black Sea resort of Sochi, to meet the German and Russian premiers.

The only problem was that the flight to the summit would not be of sufficient duration for him to get a full night's sleep.

The answer was simple: the French air force, which operates the presidential Airbus 319, was ordered to tack another 1,200 miles on to its flight so that Mr Chirac could sleep undisturbed.

The result was a trip to Russia that took the plane due west from Paris towards the Channel Islands, over Brest, south towards Nantes, down from Bordeaux to Toulouse, north back to Paris, and then due east to Moscow.

Le Canard Enchainé revealed that, after its airborne tour of France and a four-hour flight to Russia, the French president arrived in time for breakfast.

The flight is reported to have cost somewhere in five figures.

¡Con la de queroseno que quema un aparato de estos!