Piotr Jaroszewicz

Piotr Jaroszewicz (['pʲɔtr jarɔˈʂɛvit͡ʂ] ; 8 October 1909 – 1 September 1992) was a Polish politician who served as Prime Minister of Poland between 1970 and 1980. After he was forced out of office, he lived quietly in a suburb of Warsaw until his murder in 1992.

Life and career

Jaroszewicz was born on 8 October 1909 in Nieśwież, in the Minsk Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Belarus). After finishing secondary school in Jasło, he started working as a teacher and headmaster in Garwolin. After the outbreak of World War II and the Nazi-Soviet alliance established by the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, he moved to the Soviet-occupied zone of Poland. It has been claimed that he was a headmaster at Pinsk gymnasium. However, on 10 July 1940, he was deported to Slobodka, Krasnoborski region, Arkhangelsk, from Stolin together with his first wife, Oksana Gregorevna (born in Salov/Calow 1914) and daughter Olila (born 1940). In 1943 he joined the 1st Polish Army of Gen. Zygmunt Berling. The following year he joined the Polish Workers Party and was promoted to deputy political commander of the 1st Army.

After the war, he became the deputy minister of defence (1945–1950). Since 1956, he was the Polish ambassador to COMECON. At the same time, between 1952 and 1970, he served as a deputy Prime Minister of Poland and briefly (1954–1956) as the minister of mining industry. Jaroszewicz was a member of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party since its creation in 1948, and since 1964, he was also a member of the Political Bureau. From December 1970 until February 1980, he was the Prime Minister of Poland. The economic policies of Jaroszewicz and Edward Gierek led to a wave of protests in 1976 and 1980. In 1980, he gave up all his party posts and was expelled from the party the following year.