From the AP via Newsday

WARSAW, Poland — Zdzislaw Rurarz, a former Polish ambassador to Japan who humiliated Poland’s communist regime by defecting to the U.S. in 1981 to protest its imposition of martial law, has died of cancer, his daughter said Saturday. He was 76.

Rurarz died Jan. 21 at the Inova Fairfax Hospital in northern Virginia, his daughter, Ewa Rurarz-Huygens, told The Associated Press by telephone from Reston, Va., where his family lives.

Rurarz was one of two Polish ambassadors who defected after Poland’s last communist leader, Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski, imposed martial law on Dec. 13, 1981 in an attempt to crack down on Solidarity, a trade union pushing for democratic change.

The defections of the two communist party loyalists from such prestigious positions came as a humiliating blow to the regime that, it later turned out, was poised to collapse eight years later.

Solidarity, led by Lech Walesa, eventually prevailed, helping to end communist rule in 1989. However, Poland endured 19 months of martial law — harsh military rule that saw Solidarity leaders, including Walesa, imprisoned and about 100 people killed.

The other ambassador to defect was Romuald Spasowski, the ambassador to the United States…