Krim Belkacem

Krim Belkacem (in Kabyle: Krim Belqasem) (September 14, 1922, Aït Yahia Moussa, Tizi Ouzou Province - October 18, 1970) was an Algerian revolutionary fighter and politician.

Biography

Krim was born in the village of Aït Yahia Moussa (now in Tizi Ouzou Province) in the Berber-speaking Kabylie region of Algeria. During the Second World War, he joined the French Army, and was promoted corporal in the First Algerian Sharpshooter Regiment, reputedly becoming an excellent shot. Demobilized on October 4, 1945, he returned to his home village, where he took up a bureaucratic post. Krim joined the underground Algerian People's Party at the beginning of 1946, setting up clandestine cells in 12 villages around Draa el-Mizan. Accused of the murder of a forest warden in 1947, he was hunted and he joined the maquis under the Pseudonym of Si Rabah with Moh Nachid, Mohand Talah and Messaoud Ben Arab. Twice sentenced to death by French tribunals in 1947 and 1950, he became the Kabylie responsible of the PPA-MTLD paramilitary organization founded in February 1947 by Messali Hadj, the Organisation Spéciale, at the head of 22 members of the resistance (maquisards).