Barbara Balzerani, a former terrorist and writer who served in the Red Brigades, has died at 75. Born in the province of Rome in 1949, she had joined the Red Brigades in 1975 and was a leader of its "Rome Column", taking part in numerous assassinations and the Via Fani ambush to kidnap politician Aldo Moro. In 1981 he participated in the kidnapping of NATO General James Lee Dozier. After the decline and crisis of the Red Brigades, Balzerani was arrested in June 1985. From prison she claimed the murder of former Florence mayor Lando Conti by the RB and was sentenced to life in prison. Barbara Balzerani has never technically repented or disassociated herself, at least not along the paths followed by other former members of the organization. However, having repeatedly expressed a critical attitude toward the history of the armed struggle, she cannot even place herself among the "diehards" proper. In 1993, she declared that she felt "a deep regret for those who were affected in their affections because of those events and who continue to feel offended at every public appearance of those who, like me, made and declared themselves responsible for them". She had been granted parole on December 12, 2006, returning to freedom for good, having served her sentence, in 2011.
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