Algeria buries independence war hero

Name: Algeria buries independence war hero
Uploaded: 2016-01-01T20:31:31Z
Description: Tens of thousands turn out for funeral in Hocine Ait Ahmed’s birthplace after his death in Switzerland.

Tens of thousands turn out for funeral in Hocine Ait Ahmed’s birthplace after his death in Switzerland.

Media and members of the Front of Socialist Forces (FFS) party surround the coffin of Ait Ahmed, an FFS leader, at the party headquarters in Algiers — Ait Ahmed was the last of nine Algerian war heroes to die [Ramzi Boudina/Reuters]

Tens of thousands of Algerians have massed in a mountain village to bury a national hero of the independence war with France.

People & Power – Algeria: The revolution that never was

Hocine Ait Ahmed, also an opposition figure who spent nearly a quarter-century in exile in Europe, was buried on Friday in the Kabyle village where he was born.

A day earlier, Ait Ahmed’s body arrived in Algiers, the Algerian capital. The country’s leading opposition figure died on Wednesday in Lausanne, Switzerland, at 89.

Ait Ahmed had requested a burial in his native village, Ath Ahmedh, next to his mother’s grave, the AP news agency reported.

The ceremony transformed into a scene of chaos as crowds flooded the winding mountain roads to view the flag-draped coffin.

Ait Ahmed had been the last of nine heroes of Algeria’s war of independence to die.

Source: AP