Crowds poured into the streets of Uruguay's capital on Wednesday to bid a poignant farewell to former President José Mujica, a former guerrilla who became a pioneering leader and icon of the Latin American left,

Jose “Pepe” Mujica, a former leftist rebel who became Uruguay’s president from 2010 to 2015, has died at the age of 89.

His presidency was, by many policy measures, unremarkable. But his austere lifestyle made him revered by many Uruguayans for living like them, while giving him a platform in the international press to...