Lindsey German, national convenor of Stop the War Coalition, recalls Ben Bella, the leader of the revolutionary struggle to free Algeria from French colonial rule, who became the first president of his liberated country in 1963, and who died at the age of 95, on 11 April 2012

Ahmed Ben Bella, who has died aged 95, was one of the last living embodiments of the fight against colonialism in Africa in the 1950s and 1960s. Born into a peasant family in French ruled Algeria, he became political as a teenager and went on the fight for national liberation against the French.

Algeria was then directly ruled from France, its dominance assured by repression and racism, and its rule enhanced by large numbers of white settlers who helped maintain the status quo. Ben Bella first took up arms against French rule in the late 1940s. He and others formed the FLN (National Liberation Front) in 1954 which was determined to fight a war of independence against the colonialists.

The war was one of the most devastating of postwar times. Ben Bella was imprisoned for much of it. The story of the war and the many struggles if the Algerian people is best told in Costa Gavras marvellous film Battle of Algiers. The FLN carried out bombing campaigns in Algeria and in France.

A notorious event occurred during a peaceful pro FLN demonstration in Paris in October 1961 where police, under the direction of the police chief Maurice Papon, previously a collaborator under Nazi occupation, threw hundreds of demonstrators into the river Seine and killed more at the police station. Many drowned and it is estimated hundreds died.

The strength of the movement forced France to grant independence in 1962 and Ben Bella became president, although was forced out two years later. He was held under house arrest by his successor, Boumedienne, and only released in 1979, when he moved to France and then Switzerland.

Ben Bella spent his last years as a campaigner for Palestinian rights and against war.

I first met him at a conference in Beirut in 2002 where he spoke eloquently. He invited me and other political activists to a lunch by the Mediterranean where we talked about war and imperialism. He was intelligent, well informed and highly committed. When we had our huge demonstration on February 15 2003 in London against the Iraq war, Ben Bella came and spoke.

Referring to his long hatred of French rule and his battle for independence, he nonetheless recognised French government opposition to the coming war. ‘That is why I am pleased to say, Vive la France’ he said. The crowd roared its approval.

Our condolences to his wife, Zahra, and to his family. The issues he campaigned around and opposed _ war, the plight of the Palestinians, racism in France against its Arab population -- are all still with us. And while countries like Algeria are nominally independent, the unfinished business of imperialism continues.