Name Barbara Kistler | Occupation politician, guerrilla | |
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Political party Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist–Leninist | ||
Barbara Anna Kistler (21 November 1955 – January 1993) was a Swiss maoist revolutionary, TKP/ML activist and member of the Workers' and Peasants' Liberation Army of Turkey.
Biography
Kistler was born in Zürich, Switzerland. She was member of the Group Against Isolation (KGI), which was seeking to build a Communist Party in Switzerland. In 1980, she met communists from Turkey who had fled to Switzerland to escape the military coup. In 1986 Barbara Kistler came into contact with sympathizers of the TKP/ML. On 19 May 1991, she was arrested in Istanbul together with her comrades. She was held incommunicado for 10 days and according to Marcel Bosonnet (a Swiss lawyer) "severely tortured" Kistler was released on September 16 and returned to Switzerland. Then she went back to Turkey. She decided to go to the mountains of Turkey to join the armed struggle of the Workers' and Peasants' Liberation Army of Turkey. She was killed in Tunceli Province, in 1993.