Chirac thanks men who saved him from bullet

FRENCH president Jacques Chirac today rang four men to thank them for saving him from an assassin's bullet.

Security officials credited the four spectators and police with thwarting the attack by a neo-Nazi who pulled a rifle from a guitar case during the Bastille Day parade in Paris yesterday.

The man fired at least once from a fully loaded rifle as Chirac, riding in an open-top jeep about 50 yards away, was reviewing troops at the start of a pomp-filled military parade to celebrate France’s national holiday.