Former Polish communist leader Mr Edward Gierek, who was toppled in 1980 by a bloodless revolution that produced Eastern Europe's first independent labour movement, died yesterday aged 88.
Considered one of the most liberal communist leaders of the former Soviet camp, Mr Gierek died in the southern town of Cieszyn of a mining-related lung ailment, his son said today.
The tall, burly party boss tried to introduce some Western-style reforms during his 10 years in power but left Poland deep in debt.The government is still repaying that debt 12 years after the downfall of the old regime.
Mr Gierek became a communist activist while working as a youth in collieries in France and Belgium. He became first secretary of Poland's ruling communist United Workers' Party when previous leader Mr Wladyslaw Gomulka was forced to step down in 1970 after more than 40 workers were shot dead in food price riots.
He was swept from office in 1980 amid another wave of food price protests that led to the emergence of Solidarity, the Soviet bloc's first free trade union.
"On the list of Poland's communist first secretaries, Gierek did the least harm to Poland," said Mr Lech Walesa, the Solidarity founder who was elected president after communism fell in 1989. "He opened up Poland to the world, but at the same time threw the country into terrible debt".
Mr Gierek, remembered with nostalgia by many Poles suffering hardship under a free market economy, introduced a new, more relaxed style of rule that included cultural amenities and more freedom to travel than permitted by other Soviet bloc countries.
His departures from orthodox communist rule included licences for the Fiat mini car that helped put Poland on wheels, and the importation ofbuses from France, tractors from Britain and Coca-Cola and Marlboro cigarettes from America.