# Assault on a Foreign Leader **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 16, 2008, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421 "2008-12-16T17:41:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/1 "2008-12-16T17:41:39Z")
The recent [incident](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28220165/) in Iraq has got me thinking. When was the last time a Head of State or major dignitary was assaulted on foreign soil? Arch-duke Ferdinand is the last one I can think of. There has to have been another in the last 94 years. I am not looking for any political points, so please confine them to one of the many threads on MPSIMS. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/2 "2008-12-16T17:44:08Z")
> **[Live grenade thrown at George Bush in Georgia - Wikinews, the free news source](https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Live_grenade_thrown_at_George_Bush_in_Georgia)** Grenade was a dud, and possibly too far to have killed him. Still… ---
**Author:** ![42fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/b487fb/32.png) [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/3 "2008-12-16T17:47:34Z")
Someone lobbed a grenade at George W. Bush during a speech in Georgia (country, not state) in 2005. For fatal assaults, the last one I can think of is former Nicaraguan ruler Anastasio Somoza being gunned down while in exile in Paraguay in 1980. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/4 "2008-12-16T17:47:36Z")
Here’s a few more: > **[List of assassinations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assassinations_and_assassination_attempts)** > > This is a list of assassinations, sorted by location. > For the purposes of this article, an assassination is defined as the deliberate, premeditated murder of a prominent figure, often for religious, political or monetary reasons. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/5 "2008-12-16T18:06:53Z")
In 1994 [Cyprien Ntaryamira](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyprien_Ntaryamira), President of Burundi, was killed when his plane, also carrying Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, was shot down while approaching Kigali airport in Rwanda. However, Habyarmana was probably the primary target of the assassination. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/6 "2008-12-16T18:12:33Z")
Oh yeah - I had forgotten about the grenade. ---
**Author:** ![Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hypnagogic_jerk/32/4252_2.png) [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/7 "2008-12-16T18:16:05Z")
> [@Mollie\_Magill](#): > > The recent [incident](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28220165/) in Iraq has got me thinking. When was the last time a Head of State or major dignitary was assaulted on foreign soil? Arch-duke Ferdinand is the last one I can think of. There has to have been another in the last 94 years. Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was then part of Austria-Hungary. Of course Austria-Hungary was an empire, so you could argue that he was an Austrian visiting Bosnia. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/assault-on-a-foreign-leader/477421/8 "2008-12-16T21:09:53Z")
Let’s not forget [Vice President Richard Nixon](http://nixon.archives.gov/thelife/nixonbio.pdf) (warning: pdf0 > [@](#): > > On one such trip to Caracas, Venezuela, on May 13, 1958, protesters first spat on the vice president and Mrs. Nixon at the airport. Later that day, rioters assaulted Nixon’s motorcade, injuring Venezuela’s foreign minister and threatening Nixon and Pat with death.