Rose Vella, the mother of slain journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, was laid to rest on Saturday. 

She died on Thursday following an illness. 

A mother of four who lived in Sliema throughout her life, Vella found herself thrust into national prominence following her daughter’s assassination in 2017.

Caruana Galizia was a prominent journalist and blogger who was regularly singled out for criticism by the Labour Party. The criticism sometimes turned to aggression, and Vella was constantly worried about her daughter's safety. 

"The constant worry and tension was a cause of health problems to me, leading to frequent stays in hospital," she testified. 

The murder took its toll on her health: in December 2019, she testified that she had suffered a stroke after her daughter’s death, with doctors telling her the two events were most likely linked.

Despite health issues, Vella campaigned tirelessly for justice for her murdered daughter, attending monthly vigils and court hearings related to the case and leading protest marches from the front. 

Her daughter's murder was the second major tragedy she had to weather in life: in 1999, her only brother died in a shipwreck off Sardinia. 

European Parliament president Roberta Metsola paid tribute to Rose Vella through a Facebook post: "A rock who, even simply by clutching an image of her daughter or through the grip of her hand, held up a mirror to a society that too often looked like it had lost its way. Rose never backed down."

Nationalist Party leader Bernard Grech was among those offered condolences to the family. 

Lawyer Jason Azzopardi, who is part of the family’s legal team in proceedings linked to the Caruana Galizia murder, was among the first to pay tribute to Vella.

“She was a woman of extraordinary dignity. A woman made of steel but with a heart of velvet,” he wrote. “Now she is with her daughter Daphne. We promise to continue what she started, in her name and Daphne’s,” Azzopardi pledged.