Polish president guest of honour at 1956 events

Budapest, September 5 (MTI) – Polish President Andrzej Duda will be the guest of honour at Hungary’s official commemorations of the 60th anniversary of its 1956 anti-Soviet revolution in October, the organising committee’s chairman said.

Zoltán Balog, the minister for human resources, said the memorial committee met on Monday to discuss details of the events planned for October 23.

Duda and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán will address a rally to be held on the square in front of Hungarian Parliament on October 23, the day when the revolution broke out 60 years ago. Balog said the committee had proposed to Orbán that instead of aiming to invite the largest possible number of foreign heads of state, one special guest should be invited.

Fully 725 programmes from over 280 localities received government support to hold a commemoration or build a memorial site in connection with the revolution’s anniversary, Mária Schmidt, co-chair of the memorial committee, said. A central programme series organised for October 22-November 4 is planned, details of which will be announced later, Balog said.

Foreign programmes to be organised in over 100 cities will run under the slogan “Freedom First”, Schmidt said. In Budapest and 19 big cities commemorative posters and announcements will be placed on public spaces and transport, as well as bank branches and petrol stations.

Source: MTI