Algerian politician Born in the eastern city of Constantine into a poor family Ali Kafi became involved in the anti-colonial struggle at an early age, after the massacre at Setif, where nationalist unrest that broke out at the end of the Second World War was brutally suppressed by French forces, leaving thousand dead. He became a leading member of the Algerian underground that fought for independence from 1954 until the country became independent in 1962. Ali Kafi went on to become an ambassador to Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Iraq and Italy. He was brought out of retirement to help solve the crisis caused due to the cancelling of the second round of election in 1992 and was named part of the High Committee of State until 1994; a part of the period of Algeria's bloody civil war that lasted more than a decade and cost 200,000 lives.