As one of the most prominent of politicians in a newly de-Communized Eastern Europe, Slovak leader Vladimir Meciar (born 1942) has been called the "architect of his country's independence," but has also faced criticism for his role in the breakup of the former Czechoslovakia.

Vladimir Meciar, a lawyer and onetime Communist, rose to political power after the "Velvet Revolution" of 1989 that ousted decades of socialist, pro-Soviet leadership in Czechoslovakia. Held as a heroic figure among some segments of the Slovak electorate, Meciar has held the prime minister position for the majority of the years since its split into the independent nation of Slovakia.

Meciar was born in 1942 in Zvolen, Czechoslovakia--in the Slovak region of the country--into a proletariat family where his mother, even after the rise to prominence of her son, worked as a janitor in a factory. He attended Comenius University in Bratislava, the Slovak capital, and first...