The former President of the Republic of Hungary, Árpád Göncz celebrates his 90th birthday this Friday. He was the translator of over a hundred literary works, and a writer before becoming the first President of the Third Republic.

Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán held his annual speech on Tuesday, saying that Hungary now stands on new foundations, which he called an “irreversible fact”. Opposition parties dismissed his views as lies that are distant from reality.

Lynch atmosphere emerged in Guinea Bissau between government officials and a group of Hungarians who participated in a marathon rally between Budapest and West Africa. The dispute concerned the sale of rally cars to the locals.

Ensuring the independence of the central bank (NBH) and guaranteeing the normal functioning of the judiciary are preconditions for the start of formal talks with the IMF and the EU on financial assistance for Hungary, EU Commissioner László Andor says.

The world faces the “urgent challenge” of creating 600 million productive jobs over the next decade in order to generate sustainable growth and maintain social cohesion, says the 2012 annual report of the International Labor Organization.

Danish toymaker Lego will start construction of an 80,000-sqm plant in Nyíregyháza, NE Hungary this summer, according to, the general manager and vice-president of Lego Manufacturing Ltd., Lego’s Hungarian subsidiary.

Two Hungarians have been killed in an attack in northern Ethiopia and another Hungarian was slightly injured, Interpol's office in Ethiopia said. Two Germans and an Austrian were killed with two Germans and two Ethiopians kidnapped.

Hungarian football (soccer) referee Viktor Kassai has been voted the world’s top football (soccer) referee in 2011 in a survey by the organization IFFHS, pushing previous year’s winner English Howard Webb to second place.

Hungarians are most concerned about losing their jobs or becoming poor, an international survey by the Ipsos group conducted in 27 countries late last year and now released to the Hungarian news agency MTI shows.

Hungarian Grand Master Judit Polgár is the best female player in history. An article in the 2011 December issue of Diplomacy & Trade featured an article of the youngest Polgár sister who has ruled the world of women's chess for over two decades.

Lao Minister of Industry and Commerce Dr. Nam Viyaketh delivered a presentation at the Lao Embassy in Vienna about the manifold possibilities and endless business opportunities the country can offer to future investors.

The governing Fidesz majority of Hungarian Parliament has ruled that from now on, the National Bank of Hungary may get a government-appointed Vice Governor, the headcount of the rate-setting Monetary Council can be increased.

The Hungarian government’s "insistence on its unorthodox policy mix, together with an ill-founded hope that international lenders will eventually drop their provisions," Roubini Global Economics sums up Hungary's current situation in its latest research.

The Hungarian Minister for National Development Tamás Fellegi announced that he had tendered his resignation, asking the prime minister to relieve him of his post so that he has time to perform other important duties.

Earlier than originally planned, the first satellite made entirely in Hungary, Masat-1 may be launched into orbit on the first mission of the new Vega rocket of the European Space Agency from Kourou, French Guyana at the end of January 2012.