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Eugeniusz Szyr

SZYR, EUGENIUSZ (1915– ), Polish economist and Communist politician. Born in Warsaw, Szyr joined the Communist youth movement at the age of 15 and volunteered for the International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War. During World War II he fled to Russia and served as political officer in the Soviet-sponsored Polish army. Szyr returned to Poland in 1945 and held important economic positions in the Polish government. He was vice chairman of the state commission for economic planning from 1949 to 1953 and was its chairman from 1953 to 1956. He became a member of the government economic council in the following year and in 1964 was made a vice premier. Szyr was a leading figure in the ruling Polish United Workers' Party as a member of its central committee and later of its political bureau. During the antisemitic campaign after the Six-Day War he was publicly attacked and was not reelected to the political bureau at the 1968 party congress although he remained vice premier.


Sources: Encyclopaedia Judaica. © 2007 The Gale Group. All Rights Reserved.