Pierre Laporte
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Pierre Laporte (February 25, 1921 - October 1970), was a Canadian politician who was assassinated by members of the FLQ.
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Pierre Laporte was born in Montreal, Quebec. He was a journalist with Le Devoir from 1945 to 1961, and was known for his crusading work against the government of Quebec's then-Prime Minister Maurice Duplessis.
After Duplessis' death Laporte successfully ran for a seat in the Quebec National Assembly and served in the government of Premier Jean Lesage. Laporte was a member of the Quebec Liberal Party, and considered to be a leading member of the party's left wing. In 1969 after Lesage stepped down as party leader Laporte ran to succeed him, but lost the position to fellow cabinet member Robert Bourassa.
When Bourassa was elected Prime Minister of Quebec in 1970, he appointed Laporte as his Vice-Premier and Minister of Labour.
On October 10, 1970 Laporte was kidnapped from his home in Saint-Lambert, Quebec by a gang of radical Quebec nationalists known as the FLQ. They dubbed him the "Minister of Unemployment and Assimilation," and held him hostage in an anti-government protest. The events that followed became known as the "October Crisis" when martial law was declared and Pierre Laporte's dead body was found in the trunk of a car seven days later on October 17. He had been strangled. His kidnappers were subsequently captured and sentenced to long prison terms for his murder.
Pierre Laporte is interred in the Cimetière Notre-Dame-des-Neiges in Montreal, Quebec.
A bridge near Quebec City is named the Pierre Laporte Bridge. Several schools in Quebec and other parts of Canada have been named after Pierre Laporte.
External link
- BBC On this day October 10, 1970 Canadian minister seized by gunmen (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/10/newsid_2531000/2531261.stm)fr:Pierre Laporte