Zdeněk Fierlinger was a Czech diplomat and politician. He served as the Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia from 1944 to 1946, first in the London-based exiled government and later in liberated Czechoslovakia. His name is often associated with the merger of his Social Democratic Party with the Czechoslovak Communist Party after the communist coup in 1948. He was the uncle of Paul Fierlinger, the famous animator for numerous PBS cartoons.