Ljubo Sirc was born on 19 April 1920 in Kranj, in an industrial and commercial family. In August 1947 he was sentenced to death by so called Nagodet’s trial and later reduced sentence to 20 years of forced labour.
He spent seven and a half years in prison, two of which were solitary confinement. He was released from prison in year 1954, but there was neither a job nor a future for him in Yugoslavia, so in year 1955 he fled to Britain through Italy and started a family there.
In year 1960 he received his PhD in Economics from the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. In year 1983 he set up the Institute for the Study of Communist Economies (CRCE or Centre for Research into Communist Economies; since year 1996 Centre for Research into Post-Communist Economies).
He lived in Glasgow. For his credit for spreading democratic ideas in Eastern Europe, the British Queen personally awarded him the British CBE Award in year 2001.
He died on December 1, 2016. Posthumously, in year 2017, he received the Mr. Pučnik Plaque for the Development of Democracy.