Keith Richards pays tribute to ‘remarkable’ Anita Pallenberg

Keith Richards has paid tribute to his "remarkable" former partner Anita Pallenberg following her death earlier this week.

The Italian-German actress – who had kids Marlon, 47, and Angela, 45, with the 73-year-old rocker, as well as son Tara, who died aged just 10 weeks in 1976 – passed away aged 75 on Tuesday (13.06.17) following a long battle with an illness and, although the Rolling Stones guitarist is devastated by her passing, he has since taken to his Twitter account to pay his respects and insist he’ll "always" keep her in his heart.

Alongside a professional black-and-white photograph of Anita when she was younger, he wrote: "A most remarkable woman. Always in my heart. (sic)"

Anita’s exact cause of death is not yet known but friends close to the late star have revealed Keith – who also has two children with his wife Patti Hansen – was there for her in her final months and cared about her enormously.

Anita first met the Rolling Stones in 1965 when she and a friend snuck backstage at one of their concerts in Germany.

She initially embarked on a romance with guitarist Brian Jones – who died in 1969 – but as he grew increasingly abusive, she left him for Keith.

The pair had a turbulent relationship and split in 1980 and the ‘Brown Sugar’ musician later claimed the ‘Barbarella’ actress – who was the band’s muse and sang backing vocals on ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ – had had an affair with the group’s frontman Sir Mick Jagger.

Anita and Keith lived a wild partying life together, but the ‘Candy’ actress later insisted she didn’t regret the hedonistic period.

She said in 2008: "I don’t think they were lost years. I went about doing what I did, travelling anyway, even if sometimes they had to carry me. Self-medication they call it now. I went into this – what do they call it before you become a butterfly? – cocoon for a long time. And in a way it’s kept me probably more childlike; that’s what drugs do to people, they stop emotional growth, so when you come out of it you’re kind of 17."