Former US ambassador to Hungary dies

Mark Palmer, who served as United States Ambassador to Hungary from 1986 until 1990 – and as such was the last American ambassador to the Communist regime in Hungary –, has died at the age of 72 after a long struggle with cancer.

A diplomat with wide-ranging experience, Robie Marcus Hooker Palmer played a highly visible role, including participation in demonstrations against the regime towards the end of the 1980s.

The Hungarian news portal origo.hu reminds that early last year, Palmer made waves when he went on record claiming that Hungary could be expelled from the European Union due to the ‘abuses’ of democracy by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and that the United States should set up a new radio station to transmit news into Hungary.

In 2009, then-Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai presented Palmer with the Order of Merit, Commander’s Cross in recognition of the former diplomat’s role in the transition, calling him “a legendary ambassador whose name will go down in Hungarian history books.”

Mark Palmer served in the U.S. State Department between 1964 and 1990, wriring speeches – among others for Ronald Reagan and Henry Kissinger. He was a member of the American Academy of Diplomacy and the Committee on the Present Danger, Vice Chairman of Freedom House and the Council for a Community of Democracies.