Hungarian Uprising 50 Years Ago
October 23, 2006
In the early hours of Monday morning, Hungarian police broke up a long-running demonstration in Budapest's Parliament square, before official commemorations of the anti-Soviet uprising fifty years ago.
The demonstrators had been calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany after he admitted to lying about the depressed state of the economy before the general elections in April.
Although the police claimed that they had found knives, stones and gunpowder at the site of the demonstrations, the square had been peacefully cleared at 3:00 a.m., in stark contrast to the 12 day uprising that began on October 23, 1956, and left thousands of Hungarians dead.
Commemorations marred by current political divide
What had then begun as a peaceful student protest erupted into a spontaneous mass upheaval against Stalinist oppression. It swept up millions of ordinary people, and initially forced the withdrawal of Soviet forces, but was then brutally crushed by Soviet tanks.
Some 200,000 people fled in the aftermath, and over 200 Hungarians, including Imre Nagy, who was prime minister at the time, were executed, sealing Hungary's fate as a Soviet satellite until the fall of the Iron Curtain and its transition to a democracy in 1989. Hungary joined the European Union in 2004 with several other former satellite states in central and eastern Europe.
The 1956 commemorations threaten to be overshadowed by Hungary's current political divide. Fidesz, the main right wing party, which opposes Gyurcsany's governing socialists, the successor to the Communist Party, plans to boycott the commemorations and hold a separate rally. Gyurcsany, a former leftist youth leader, has been accused of using his old communist party links to make a personal fortune through unsavoury property deals in the early 1990s, after the break up of the Soviet Union.
European leaders to attend ceremonies today
Delegations from over 50 countries, including Spain's King Juan Carlos, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso, German President Horst Kohler and NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, will attend services at the parliament square, and are scheduled to visit the grave of Imre Nagy later during the day.
The celebrations, which commenced Sunday, were already marred when veterans of the 1956 uprising, refused to shake hands with Gyurcsany at a state awards ceremony. Hungarian President Laszlo Solyom appealed to the opposition Fidesz party to put aside party differences and celebrate in the spirit of the uprising.
Appeals for national unity
"To be selective with the past has become standard since 1989. (Politicians) are not only celebrating apart, they are celebrating different things. They say there are many 1956s and with this, the value and significance of 1956 is devalued. I however say that there is only one revolution of 1956," said Solyom at Sunday's ceremony that began with a concert at the Hungarian State Opera.
Austrian President Heinz Fischer, who was also at the ceremony, urged Hungarians to overcome their division. "One thing is clear. The freedom fight of 1956 was not in vain as it showed the courage of the Hungarian people. What was crushed in 1956, was achieved peacefully in 1989," he said.
Ceremonies to mark the anniversary today, include the unveiling of a new monument to honour those who died in the Hungarian Uprising.