Jan Nowak-Jezioranski, 91; Veteran of Polish Resistance, Official of Radio Free Europe

Jan Nowak-Jezioranski, a wartime courier for the Polish anti-Nazi resistance and the director of Radio Free Europe’s Polish service during the Cold War, has died, Polish officials said Friday. He was 91.

Nowak-Jezioranski died Thursday in a Warsaw hospital. The cause of death was not reported.

“A great Pole, a hero and a great authority has gone,” former Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki said on state radio.

Nowak-Jezioranski fought in the brief 1939 campaign after Nazi Germany’s invasion of Poland. After his country was defeated and occupied, he joined the resistance movement and fought in the 1944 Warsaw uprising against the Nazis.

He risked his life as a courier between the Polish government-in-exile in London and the Polish underground resistance in German-occupied Poland, completing five trips -- including parachute jumps.

The uprising began Aug. 1, 1944, and lasted 63 days, leaving about 200,000 insurgents and civilians dead. Nowak-Jezioranski sneaked back out of Nazi-occupied Poland after the revolt failed, carrying intelligence material and film showing the struggle.

In London, Prime Minister Tony Blair’s office praised Nowak-Jezioranski’s courage in a statement Friday.

“Throughout his life, Nowak-Jezioranski was one of Europe’s most determined and heroic fighters for truth and freedom, and a true Polish patriot,” Downing Street said.

“In particular, we remember the role he played in coming to London during World War II as a member of the Polish underground resistance and more recently the part he played in bringing history to light as a member of the Anglo-Polish Historical Committee.”

After the war, Nowak-Jezioranski worked in Munich, West Germany, for Radio Free Europe, a U.S.-funded station that broadcast to countries behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War.

In 1976, he moved to Washington, where he served as a consultant to the National Security Council. In 1996, President Clinton awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, for his service during the war and at Radio Free Europe.

There was no immediate word about funeral arrangements or survivors.