| Advertisement |
May 27 (UPI) -- Zbigniew Brzezinski, who served as President Jimmy Carter's national security advisor during his four years in office, died Friday at age 89 in a Virginia hospital. His daughter, Mika Brzezinski, co-host of MSNBC's "Morning Joe," announced her father's death on social media. She did not give a cause of death.
Advertisement
"He was known to his friends as Zbig, to his grandchildren as Chief and to his wife as the enduring love of her life," she said in a post on Instagram.
Brzezinski, who was Polish born, served as Carter's national security advisor during the Iran hostage crisis and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He helped Carter bridge the gap between Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to the Camp David peace accords.
Chief at the helm!
— Mika Brzezinski (@morningmika) May 27, 2017
We love you, Dad, and will always be grateful for the love and devotion you showed us all. #HailToTheChief pic.twitter.com/4OtLuYIyZY
Carter and his wife Rosalynn expressed their condolences, calling Brzezinski "an important part of our lives for more than four decades" and "a superb public servant."
"He played an essential role in all the key foreign policy events of my administration, including normalization of relations with China, signing of the SALT II treaty, brokering the Camp David Accords, and the Panama Canal treaties, among others," Carter said. "He was brilliant, dedicated, and loyal, and remained a close advisor to my work at The Carter Center. I will miss him."
Among his other accomplishments, Brzezinski was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Carter in 1981 for working to normalize relations between the United States and China and for his work to advance human rights.
