Farewell to Dr. Heinrich Klier – South Tyrol News
Innsbruck/Bozen – On October 6, 2022, the former freedom fighter Dr. Heinrich Klier died in Innsbruck at the age of 95. Roland Lang, chairman of the Südtiroler Heimatbund (SHB) expresses his sympathy and publishes an obituary, the wording of which follows:
dr Heinrich Klier was born on November 27, 1926 in Zirl. From a young age he was an avid alpinist. In the last months of the Second World War he was sent to the front in Slovenia. There he learned how to use weapons and explosives.
After returning home, he studied philology in Innsbruck. In the 1950s he published several novels and worked as a journalist for “Radio Tirol”, where he wrote reports about South Tyrol.
In the 1950s, Klier became convinced that the normally fascist Italianization policy in South Tyrol had to be put to an end. He joined the North Tyrolean group of the “Liberation Committee South Tyrol” (BAS), which was being founded and was supported by prominent members of the North Tyrolean state government. The aim was to make the world public aware of the situation in South Tyrol without sacrificing human life.
At that time there was a monument cast from aluminum in front of the Montecatini power plant in Waidbruck, which showed Benito Mussolini in a heroic pose on a horse. During the fascist period, the monument was dedicated to the “genius of fascism” – “AL GENIO DEL FASCISMO” – with an inscription. In 1945 only the inscription had been removed.
In the night from January 29th to 30th, 1961, Heinrich Klier, together with Kurt Welser from Innsbruck, blew the “Duce” and his horse off the base. The freedom fighter Alfons Obermair from Bolzano was the lookout. The monument was not re-erected.
When such isolated attacks did not bring about a rethinking of the rulers in Rome, the thunderbolt of the “Night of Fire” followed in the night of June 12th to 13th, 1961, which fell victim to the 40 high-voltage pylons in South Tyrol. Dr. been involved.
When an arrest warrant was issued against him in Austria, he fled to Bavaria, worked for a mountain sports publisher and wrote for newspapers. In Milan in 1964 he was sentenced in absentia to 21 years in prison. He returned to Austria and was acquitted in three South Tyrol trials, the last time on May 31, 1967, along with the other defendants, because the jury had set up the defendants’ actions as legitimate resistance to state injustice.
Klier was one of the active supporters of the granting of Austrian citizenship to the South Tyroleans, for whom he personally collected signatures!
Heinrich Klier was also an outstanding alpinist and successful businessman, who above all opened up the Stubaital through tourist cable car companies and thus contributed a lot to the prosperity of the population.
We remember him with sadness and our condolences to his family.
From: mk