It was inevitable. Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Iraqi television reporter who became infamous for throwing his shoes at a nimble former President George W. Bush last December, was himself the target of a copycat shoe-thrower during an appearance in Paris.

Just like Bush, al-Zaidi ducked in time to avoid the shoe which smacked the backdrop behind him. And according to reports, he was unfazed. He later joked:

"He stole my technique."

As Agence France Presse reports:

Television reporter Muntazer al-Zaidi was in Paris to promote his campaign for the "victims of the US occupation in Iraq" when a fellow Iraqi critic turned the tables on him, shouting: "Here's another shoe for you."

The thickset man with an Iraqi accent made a brief speech in Arabic during the question and answer session, defending US policy and accusing Zaidi of "working for dictatorship in Iraq," before throwing his shoe.

The missile was thrown hard at Zaidi's head, but he managed to dodge it and it bounced harmlessly off a curtain erected behind the speakers by the event's hosts, the Foreign Press Welcome Centre in Paris.

Zaidi's brother grappled with and slapped the man, whom witnesses later described as an asylum-seeker they know only as "Khayat", before venue staff and bystanders separated them and the aggressor was hustled away.

"When I used this method, it was against the occupation. I did not use it against a compatriot," Zaidi complained. "I always knew the occupier and his lackeys would stop at nothing to get to me."