Marking the International Romani Day, the Hungarian Postal Service on Friday issued a series of stamps featuring Roma heroes of the 1956 revolution.
The series of ten stamps, which was presented in Budapest’s House of Terror museum, carries the reproductions of the paintings of István Szentandrássy of ten Roma heroes including eminent pianist György Cziffra and nine freedom fighters.
Presenting the series, Human Resources Minister Zoltán Balog said that
freedom has always been the glue to keep Romani and Hungarians together.
The integration of the Roma is a common interest of all Hungarians, for which the state should ensure the best possible circumstances, he said.
Integration of the Roma community is also connected with the migration issue, Balog insisted. “Doing our best to integrate the Roma provides a moral justification for our rejection of migration,” he said.
Hungary’s flag was raised and then lowered to half-mast with military honours in front of Parliament on Saturday to mark the 61st anniversary of the crushing of the 1956 revolution and freedom-fight.
The Hungarian government in 2013 declared November 4 to be a national day of mourning.
The ceremony in Kossuth Square was attended by President János Áder, Chief of Staff Tibor Benkő, members of the foreign diplomatic and military attache corps, representatives of Hungary’s military and political parties as well as state officials.
The main commemoration ceremony was held at the 1956 memorial in Budapest‘s Hargita Square. In the evening, a concert took place in St Stephen’s Basilica in memory of the martyrs of 1956.
Mourners were (and still are) invited to light candles in memory of the victims of the revolution at the Heroes’ Wall next to the House of Terror museum. A protocol-free commemoration was also held throughout the day at plot 301 of the Rákoskeresztúr Cemetery, where victims of the Soviet retaliation after the revolution are buried in unmarked graves.
It was Trancarpathia’s Hungarians who were most isolated from Hungary during the Soviet times, “and we owe them respect for preserving their self-identity and mother tongue under rather difficult circumstances”, the Hungarian justice minister said in Uzhhorod/Ungvár, in western Ukraine, on Monday.
László Trócsányi addressed a gathering in the local theatre that marked the 61st anniversary of Hungary’s ill-fated anti-Soviet uprising.
In 1956, Transcarpathia/Kárpátalja and Uzhhorod/Ungvár itself formed part of a country whose troops brought down the Hungarian revolution, he said.
Although today’s Transcarpathia region has belonged to various different states over the course of its history, its population has remained the same, the minister noted.
Speaking in the context of the endurance and thriving of Transcarpathia’s Hungarian community, Trócsányi emphasised the importance of the community’s right to education in their mother tongue without restriction.
“We firmly stand up for the Hungarian community’s right to the use of their language in education as has been enshrined in international treaties,” he said, making reference to the recently adopted Ukrainian education law.
Trócsányi earlier in the day met Hennadiy Moskal, governor of the Transcarpathia region, to discuss the contested new Ukrainian law.
He told MTI that he pointed out to Moskal that the new law violated several international accords ratified by Ukraine.
Trócsányi said he thanked the governor for supporting the Hungarian community.
During his visit, the minister laid a wreath at the city’s 1956 memorial.
Hungarians were born for freedom, Bernadett Szél, the green opposition LMP‘s candidate for prime minister, said at an event commemorating Hungary’s failed anti-Soviet uprising of 1956 in Debrecen, in eastern Hungary, on Monday.
“We can only reach our full potential and develop our strengths and creativity in freedom and independence, Szél said in her address in front of the Debrecen University’s main building.
She said Hungary was in need of “a new kind of politics” focused on the people.
Szél said there was a good chance that Hungary could “embark on a new era” in 2018.
Opposition Jobbik leader Gábor Vona called for unity among those who feel patriotic, consider themselves sober-minded and want an honest government to replace the current one, at his party’s commemoration of Hungary’s ill-fated anti-Soviet uprising of 1956 in Budapest on Monday.
“I no longer care about what separates us, but rather the things that bind us together,” Vona said, adding that there was a time when he had thought differently.
“Enough of this. I don’t care who is right wing or left wing. I don’t care who is moderate or radical. I don’t care who is conservative or liberal,” Jobbik’s candidate for prime minister said.
Vona said he and those who “live with a Hungarian heart, are sober-minded and want an honest government” were on the same side, because they agreed on the most important issues.
He said Hungary had to be protected from having to take in people of foreign cultures but also from the emigration of its youth. He called the former the “Soros plan” and the latter the “Orbán plan”, referring to US financier George Soros and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
He said
the “Vona plan” consisted of protecting Hungary from migration, ousting the Fidesz-led government and holding them accountable and lifting the country’s economy.
In order for Hungary to catch up with the West economically, it must take part in the debate on the future of the European Union and achieve a “wage union” within the bloc, he said.
Vona also called for reforming Hungary’s health-care and education systems.
Ferenc Gyurcsány, leader of the leftist opposition Democratic Coalition (DK), called the government an “enemy of the civic, European and free Hungary” at a ceremony marking Hungary’s anti-Soviet uprising in 1956 and the sixth anniversary of the founding of DK on Monday.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s “regime itself is a lie”, Gyurcsány insisted.
“Where the prime minister lies that there is democracy, there is tyranny;
when he protects pensions, he steals them; when he talks about Europe, he is looking for handouts,” he said.
He said that while 1956 united and divided Hungarians at the same time, the essence of the revolution were the dreams that spurred it on.
“Turning one’s back on the essence of 1956 is a serious mistake from a historical standpoint, while politically, it means siding with dictatorship instead of freedom,” the DK leader said.
He said today’s ruling Fidesz party had nothing in common with the liberal Fidesz party founded in 1988,
adding that DK had much more in common with the Fidesz of old.
As we wrote today, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán had a speech at a state commemoration of Hungary’s anti-Soviet uprising of 1956 in front of Budapest’s House of Terror Museum on Monday.
“If freedom and national independence are lost, then so are we,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said at a state commemoration of Hungary’s anti-Soviet uprising of 1956 in front of Budapest’s House of Terror Museum on Monday.
“Soviet rule tossed us into a space without history; it wanted to destroy our past and our culture,” Orbán said.
The prime minister said “national remembrance” was the “strongest weapon” that could prevent a repeat of the physical and intellectual terror Hungary was subjected to under Soviet rule.
Orbán said the House of Terror Museum which opened in 2002 was a reminder to the world that Hungarians’ desire for freedom could not be stifled.
Concerning the failed anti-Soviet revolution, Orbán said that western Europe “may have admired but could not understand” those developments.
“They failed to understand that we insist on our culture and way of life to the end, that we would not mix up in anybody else’s melting pot”. “We want them to respect who and what we are,” the prime minister went on to say.
“We are a brave and fighting nation, and know that those that are not respected will be despised,”
he said, and added that “they do not understand us in Brussels now because they could not understand Hungary in those days either”.
The prime minister also said that Europe had derailed to find itself heading towards a dead end, adding that the EU and many of the bloc’s member states “are being held hostage by a financial speculator empire”.
In the 20th century, trouble came in the form of “militant empires”, he said. Today, empires are rising in the shadow of globalisation, Orbán added.
“They have no borders, but have a global media network, as they also have tens of thousands of people paid to serve them. They act fast, they are strong and brutal,” the prime minister said.
“Now, three decades later, everything we consider the Hungarian way of life is under threat again,” he said.
“After achieving freedom in 1990, we have again come to a turning point in our country’s history,” Orbán said.
“What we want is a secure, fair, bourgeois, Christian, and free Europe,” the prime minister said.
Orbán said that all elections in Europe were now of “crucial” importance, and insisted that now was the time for Europe’s peoples to decide “if they take political control back over their national causes from European bureaucrats closely linked to the business elite”. “Many may still think that it is impossible,” he said, but added that in 1956, in 1988 and before 2010 people did not believe in the possibility of change, either.
In front of House of Terror Museum, photo: MTI
“We wanted to believe that the old woes could not return,” Orbán said. “We wanted to believe that the communists’ dream to turn us into Homo Sovieticus could never re-emerge.”
“But now we are stunned to see the forces of globalisation prying at the door working to mold us from Hungarians into Homo Brusselicus,” Orbán added.
On the subject of migration, the prime minister said that the “financial speculator empire” had brought the “invasion of new immigrants” onto Europe. It was they who had put together the plan to transform Europe into a “mixed continent”, he insisted.
Orbán said central Europe would be at the focus of the struggle for the future of Europe, arguing that this was a “migrant-free zone” within the continent.
“Until Brussels wins back its sovereignty, Europe’s steering wheel cannot be turned in the right direction,” he said.
Orbán said that all elections in Europe were now of “crucial” importance, and insisted that now was the time for Europe’s peoples to decide “if they take political control back over their national causes from European bureaucrats closely linked to business elites”. “Many may still think that it is impossible,” he said, but added that in 1956, in 1988 and before 2010 people did not believe in the possibility of change, either.
Orbán insisted that “migration can be stopped, globalisation can be kept under control, Brussels could be reined in and the plans of a financial speculator could be thwarted”, but added that central Europe’s “Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Romanians, and Hungarians need to join together”.
“The stakes are high; we cannot take anything lightly,” Orbán said. “We must never underestimate the power of the dark side,” he added.
Concerning Hungary’s general election next spring, Orbán voiced confidence that his Fidesz party stood a good chance of winning the vote. He said, however, that “every voter will be needed” for an election victory.
According to the data of the Central Statistical Office (KSH), 2700 people died during the events of the 1956 revolution, and more than half of the victims were under the age of 30.
Alfahir.hu cites the publication of KSH, according to which the office owns several reports that analyse the data of the events of the revolution and the period that followed the 23rd of October, 1956. The report about the victims of 1956 was already finished in 1957, but only very few people could access it.
After the change of regime, one of the first tasks of the new president, György Vukovich was to declassify the report about the victims of the 1956 revolution.
According to the data, out of the 2700 deaths 2195 were registered, while KSH found out about 307 deaths through cemeteries, exhumations and apartment deregistration. Moreover, the number of non-registered and non-exhumed deaths is around 100-150.
78% of the deaths happened in Budapest. Out of the people who fell victim to the events of the revolution, 85% were men and 15% were women.
The state healthcare service attended to almost 20 thousand injured between the 23rd of October and the end of the year. More than three fourths of the injuries were caused by machine-pistols and guns, while one fourth were caused by cannon-shots, landmine and grenade explosions. The majority of the injuries concerned limbs. Almost half of the injured were between the ages of 19 and 30, while almost one fourth were under 18. One seventh of the injured were women.
Photo: www.fortepan.hu/Nagy Gyula
Regarding the countryside, the most deaths were registered in Pest (68), Bács-Kiskun (64), Győr-Moson-Sopron (62), Komárom (53) and Fejér (50) Counties.
More than half of the deceased were under the age of 30, and the mortality of the 23-year-olds was the highest: 7 deaths fell onto 10 thousand 23-year-olds.
Another previously encrypted document of KSH was published on the 13th of July, 1957 and included the main data about people who emigrated illegally between the 23rd of October, 1956 and the 30th of April, 1957. Based on the report, 274,704 Hungarian arrived in Austria until the 6th of April, 1957, while 19,181 Hungarians fled to Yugoslavia until the 26th of May, 1957. Moreover, the number of those who stayed in Austria temporarily without registration exceeds one thousand.
The 23rd of October is one of the most important public holidays in Hungary. We commemorate the revolution of 1956, which was a nationwide uprising against the government of the People’s Republic of Hungary and its Soviet-imposed policies. Test your knowledge on the events of the revolution with the help of magyarorszagkul.nlcafe.hu‘s quiz.
Hungary’s national flag was hoisted in front of the Parliament building on Monday morning, in a state commemoration marking the 61th anniversary of the anti-Soviet uprising which started on October 23, 1956.
Hungarians rose up against the inhuman communist regime in October, 1956, and the country of 10 million people defeated the domineering Soviet Union of 200 million people for 13 days! If you never heard about the Hungarian revolution of 1956, than you can watch a video to learn about it.
The ceremony was attended by President János Áder, House Speaker László Kövér, members of government and diplomats.
Official commemorations of the revolution and freedom fight, quelled by Soviet troops which then occupied the country until 1989, will go on with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s speech at the House of Terror museum at 3 pm. Celebrations will be held nationwide and in Hungarian communities around the world.
Parts of the Parliament building will be open to visitors free of charge on Monday, including the central hall where the Hungarian royal crown is displayed.
You can read our programme guide for the 23rd fo October HERE.
Commemorations will also be held at the Rákoskeresztúr cemetery, in eastern Budapest, where the remains of executed revolutionaries were buried in unmarked graves in 1956.
Photo: MTIPhoto: MTIPhoto: Gergely Botár/kormany.hu
Photo: Gergely Botár/kormany.hu
Commemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest on Sunday, the eve of the national holiday.
Addressing a crowd at the Technical University, one of the focal points of the revolution, Justice Minister László Trócsányi paid tribute to the freedom fighters.
“Not only Hungary but Europe and the whole world have much to thank to the Hungarian freedom fighters of 1956.
They can rightly be listed among the ‘founding fathers’ of the unifying Europe. Had they been victorious, the Iron Curtain that divided Europe would have been demolished earlier,” he said.
Photo: MTI
Referring to the petition of 16 points drawn up at a student meeting at the university and sparking the revolution 61 years ago, Trócsányi said that an overwhelming majority of Hungarians continue to highly esteem political freedoms, national independence, rule of law, parliamentary democracy and social justice.
At that time, he said, Hungarians faced the key question whether they would ever join the free Europe.
“Now we are discussing what kind of Europe we want to see.
We want to have a say in shaping Europe’s future. As a free and independent country we are and want to remain part of the European processes and disputes,” Trócsányi said.
After the commemoration, thousands of people participated in a traditional torch-lit march from the university to Bem Square, another important location of the revolution.
Commemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTICommemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTICommemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTI
“One of the big lessons from the 1956 revolution and freedom fight is that we must not concede a single millimetre from our national independence,” state secretary of human resources Bence Rétvári told the crowd.
“Today we still have to fight for preserving our identity and culture, which came under threat in 2015 with the migration crisis,”
he said.
Zsolt Németh, head of parliament’s foreign affairs committee, said that, “just as many times before over the past decades, we are fighting together with our Polish friends to preserve our national sovereignty. The problem the European Union has with these two countries is that they stand up for their independence”, he added.
As we wrote before, the 28-year-old Emánuel Csorba lived at Körtér with his family in 1956, which meant that he was able to witness and capture the events of the revolution directly. The passionate photographer went from street to street and captured the historic moments of the last days of October, 1956. Photto gallery HERE.
Most of us know the storyline and there are many sources where you can read about the events, but today we want to share personal stories of civilians from the day. What better way to get an understanding of the case than from stories of the men in the streets? Read more HERE.
Commemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTICommemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTICommemorations of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising started in Budapest, photo: MTI
Hungary’s 1956 revolution was commemorated at the Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York late on Friday.
Miroslav Lajcak, President of the UN General Assembly for the 72nd session and Slovakia’s Foreign Minister, was guest of honour at the event, which was attended by deputy secretaries-general of the UN as well as renowned representatives of New York’s political and art scene.
Opening the ceremony, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Katalin Bogyay commemorated the one-time UN Special Committee on the Problem of Hungary, also greeting the current representatives of the committee’s one-time member countries. She went on to honour the memory of former Danish diplomat Povl Bang-Jensen, who died in mysterious circumstances. Bang-Jensen was a UN official who protected the Hungarian witnesses of the 1956 revolution and their families.
As one of the lessons from the revolution and freedom fight that took place 61 years ago, Bogyay emphasised the need for a strong and effective Security Council. She said
Hungary supports the comprehensive reform of the Security Council and noted the importance of the principle of the responsibility to protect.
She said “freedom is not a premise; it is something that must be protected at all times”, and the international community must pay attention to this especially in the case of religious, national and ethnic minorities. She said
the protection of ethnic, religious, racial and language freedoms is one of our most important duties today.
She also noted the importance of taking action against contemporary slavery and human trafficking.
Budapest, February 28 (MTI) – The monument commemorating Hungary’s ill-fated 1956 anti-Soviet revolution has been put in place in New York and will be unveiled on March 15, Hungary’s consul general in New York told public radio on Tuesday morning.
The abstract composition has been placed next to the full figure statue of 19th century Hungarian reform statesman Lajos Kossuth, erected in Manhattan in 1928, Ferenc Kumin told Kossuth radio.
The monument depicts the actual position of the stars — “by freezing time in stone and steel” — on October 23, 1956, the day when the revolution broke out, he said. The stars made of steel lie on a granite base, he added.
Kumin noted that the obelisk of the grave of Emilia Kossuth, the Hungarian politician’s sister, in the Green-Wood Cemetery of Brooklyn, has been cleaned and polished in cooperation with local staff.
The Inscription reads:
“Emilia Kossuth-Zulavsky born in Hungary November 12, 1817 died in Brooklyn, N.Y., June 29, 1860. Ye who return when Hungary is free / Oh, take my dust along — my heart is there. Erected by her fellow exiles who admired her in life and now mourn.”
The 1956 monument will be unveiled on March 15, Hungary’ s national day marking the start of the 1848/49 revolution and freedom fight.
For us to understand the difficulties Hungary has been going through since 1989, first we need to analyze life under Soviet occupation and how it impacted a nation that already had a long history of oppression dating back to the middle ages.
After World War II, a harsh Stalinist communist system was established in Hungary, a satellite country of the Soviet Union at the time. In the late 1940s and early 1950s private enterprise was banned, people’s individual property was confiscated, and that didn’t particularly set well with Hungarians who, by nature, are fiercely freedom-loving, highly entrepreneurial, and frequently rebellious. It didn’t take long before it was suspected that “Something big is going to happen in Hungary!” Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary, Otto von Habsburg, explains in the documentary about the Cold War and the Hungarian Revolution, Torn from the Flag.
In October, 1956, Hungarians rose up against the inhuman regime, and the tiny country of 10 million people defeated the big Soviet Union of 200 million people for 13 days. Not that Hungary had an impressive military, but the Magyars can be resourceful and witty folks, and put their soup bowls on the cobble stones of the streets of Budapest, making the Russian tanks believe that they were mines, having them stop, and then blow them up with home-made Molotov cocktails.
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However, the Soviet Union wasn’t going to risk Hungary’s defection. Fearing a domino effect on Eastern Europe, Ukraine, the Baltics, and eventually on the USSR itself, in November 1956, the Kremlin decided to roll one thousand Russian tanks into the capital of Hungary to crush the revolt mainly lead by university students. This was made easier when it became clear—notwithstanding propaganda via Radio Free Europe—that neither the United States nor Western Europe or the United Nations would aid Hungary in its freedom fight.
While the revolt was successfully suppressed, “the Hungarian Revolution had huge a international effect.” says former President of the Republic of Cyprus, George Vasiliou in the same film. “The changes [read: decline] that took place in all the communist parties of the West, were the exact results of the Hungarian Revolution.”
Dr. Ivan Berend, Professor of History and Economics at UCLA, states: “Retaliation was terribly harsh. People were executed, thousands were imprisoned.” Even 16-year old children were condemned to death, but to maintain a façade of compassion, the communists waited for the young freedom fighters’ 18th birthday to execute them.
Two hundred thousand Hungarians escaped to the West primarily via Austria and Yugoslavia. The mass exodus included the country’s intellectual and academic elite, creating a considerable vacuum in Hungary’s society.
But the consequences didn’t stop there. From 1956 to 1984, Hungary’s birth rate drastically dropped. From 1961 to 1975 alcohol consumption increased 600%. From 1956 to 1984 the country’s suicide rate increased by almost 300% and in the mid-80s it was the highest in the world! These statistics give you a glimpse on how debilitating the system was on the individual. Trauma, as we understand today, undoubtedly has long-term effects, and you can’t help but think that there might be a link to a recent statistic: in 2012 Hungary was the “Most Miserable Country” in the world. Other former Easter Block countries that also made the list are: the Russian Federation at number three, Estonia at number six, Poland at number seven, the Slovak Republic at number eight, and Slovenia at number nine. (Source: USNews.com)
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Hungarian freedom fighter, Andrew Pongratz, declares that “We knew what we did in Hungary in 1956 was the first brick that was pushed out of the wall of communism and communism had to collapse!” U.S. Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger agrees: “I don’t know whether the events of 1956 could have happened if it hadn’t been for 1956.” Yet the long-term victory of the Hungarian Revolution, delayed as it may have been, didn’t seem to provide Hungary and the neighboring countries with the moral or political springboard that one might expect.
While communism in Eastern Europe is officially over, a few were held responsible for the crimes against humanity. Today, the Russian Federation is lead by a former foreign intelligence KGB officer and the red star—communism’s swastika and the symbol of a system that estimated to kill 100,000,000 globally—is treated as a lighthearted advertisement logo of an American department store.
Communism never had its Nuremberg, and former communists do not even remotely bear similar consequences as we would expect from individuals who physically and in spirit crippled a continent-size region.
Healing may come after several generations but it would be far more satisfying if those who were willing to sacrifice their lives for their country’s freedom would see justice served in their lifetime.
The Committee of National Remembrance has released the biographies of those leaders who participated in the retaliations following the Revolution of 1956, index.hu reports.
During the revolution, the police and military forces were unable to perform their duties properly. The Soviet intervention, which began on November 4, restored the communist rule and created armed forces who supported the rule unconditionally.
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The special force regiments were created as soon as the revolution was defeated, following Soviet example. The leaders of the armed forces supported the Soviets and their Hungarian allies voluntarily. They participated in arrests, as well as seeking out and punishing revolutionaries, at a time when the coming system had not even been established yet, which rules out possible conformist behaviour.
Although certain signs point to the existence of these forces during the revolution, the regiments officially began their operations after November 9.
The list and the biographies of the leaders can be found here.
Budapest, November 21 (MTI) – Speaker of Parliament László Kövér on Monday met Dutch, Swiss and Spanish veteran athletes visiting Budapest who boycotted the 1956 Melbourne Olympics out of solidarity with Hungary due to its crushed anti-Soviet revolution.
Hungary has organised programmes to thank the athletes who gave up their dreams after the Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland withdrew in protest against the Soviet presence in the Games.
Eleven Dutch, one Spanish and one Swiss Olympian arrived in Budapest out of the 66 Swiss, 44 Dutch and four Swiss athletes who boycotted the event in 1956. They are scheduled to visit the House of Terror museum on Tuesday and attend a conference organised in their honour at the Andrássy Gyula German-language University. Later on Tuesday, they will be greeted by Hungarian Olympians at a gala evening.
Budapest, November 4 (MTI) – The Hungarian flag was raised and then lowered to half-mast with military honours in front of Parliament on Friday to mark the 60th anniversary of the crushing of the 1956 anti-Soviet uprising.
The flag will remain at half-mast throughout the day.
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The ceremony was attended by President János Áder, House Speaker László Kövér, Chief of Staff Tibor Benkő, representatives of political parties as well as state and military organisations and members of the diplomatic corps.
Photo: MTI
In the afternoon, defence ministry state secretary Tamás Vargha will pay tribute to the victims of the revolution at Budapest’s Rákoskeresztúr public cemetery.
In the evening, candle lighting ceremonies will be held nationwide in tribute to the martyrs.
The Hungarian government in 2013 declared November 4 to be a national day of mourning.
According to szeretlekmagyarorszag.hu, the communist regime adulterated the label of the great wines of 1956. Now, at the 60th of anniversary of the revolution, 150 bottles of wine were re-bottled and re-labelled.
The year of 1956 was an outstandingly good vintage similarly to 1947 and 1972, which are kept count of as the best wines of the century. But the communist regime didn’t fancy the year of 1956, so they simply labelled bottles with 1957 (this secret was only revealed after the change of regime).
To commemorate the 60th anniversary of the 1956 revolution, 150 bottles of ’56 sweet dessert wines were re-labelled and re-bottled. A beautiful image film was made about this procedure, which shows us the beautiful vineyards of Tokaj, the wine-cellar of Nemzeti Borvagyon (National Wine Asset) and the technology itself.
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Such a re-bottling has never been done in such quantity in Hungary but it is also unique on a world spectre. The 60-year-old wines were first put to sensory review by the Hungarian Wine Expert Committee, and then the origins of the wines were justified by analytic examinations. The National Wine Asset includes almost 300 thousand bottles of Tokaj Aszú, the sweet dessert wine of the region, and other wine specialties. For instance, the oldest ones were bottled in 1865.
