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Viktor Orbán

Historical Figure

Viktor Orbán

b. 1963

Prime Minister of Hungary (1998–2002; since 2010)

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Biography

Viktor Mihály Orbán is a Hungarian lawyer and politician who has been the 56th prime minister of Hungary since 2010, previously holding the office from 1998 to 2002. He has also led the Fidesz political party since 2003, and previously from 1993 to 2000. He was re-elected as prime minister in 2014, 2018, and 2022. On 29 November 2020, he became the country's longest-serving prime minister.

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Timeline

The story of Viktor Orbán, told in moments.

1989 Event

Gave a fiery speech at the reburial ceremony for Imre Nagy, the executed leader of the 1956 Hungarian uprising. Demanded Soviet troops leave Hungary. He was 26. The speech was broadcast live and made him famous overnight.

1998 Event

Became prime minister at 35. During his first term, Hungary joined NATO. Lost reelection in 2002 and spent eight years in opposition, transforming his party Fidesz from a liberal youth movement into a conservative nationalist force.

2010 Life

Returned to power with a constitutional supermajority. Rewrote Hungary's constitution, packed courts, consolidated media, and promoted what he called "illiberal democracy." Critics called it democratic backsliding. He called it defending Christian civilization.

2020 Event

Became Hungary's longest-serving prime minister. Re-elected again in 2022. Cultivated relationships with Putin, Xi Jinping, and Erdogan while clashing with the EU over rule of law. His government has been called a "mafia state" by some analysts.

In Their Own Words (13)

The problem is the war. If we integrate Ukraine into the European Union, we would integrate the war. And we would not like to be together in one community with a country who is in war and represent an imminent danger to us. Because if a member of the European Union is in war, it means that the European Union is war and we don't like it.

When questioned about the integration of Ukraine into the European Union by reporters in English ahead of the European Council summit in Brussels (June 26, 2025)."Hungary opposes Ukraine's EU membership, says it would mean integrating war", Anadolu Agency., 2025

The Westerners have chosen to live in a post-national and post-Christian world, and we respect that. But they want even more. They want us to live that way too. For this reason, if any spirituality emerges in regional cooperation that includes the protection of national Christian cultures, ideological attacks immediately follow – a left-liberal attack that stems from Brussels but which is linked to American liberal and economic powers. They don’t want us to be free, they want us to be free only in the way they would like us to be.

Interview with Glas Koncila (20 June 2021), 2021

After the Communist era we made many mistakes. By the time we noticed what was actually going on, we had lost control over key national resources – the energy system, the banking sector, the media – all of which passed into the hands of foreigners, and not on the basis of some rational plan, it was simply taken away from us. I've been working for 10 years to get back what we should not have wasted.

Interview with Glas Koncila (20 June 2021), 2021

Is it possible to successfully reject migration, to protect families, to defend Christian culture, to announce a programme of national unification and nation building, and to create an order of Christian freedom? Is it possible in all this to survive against the full force of an international headwind, and indeed to make it succeed?

Tusnádfürdő speech (27 July 2019), 2019

With regard to migration, I welcome Europe's increasing movement towards a sensible policy and sensible measures. I would like to make it clear that recently Hungary has closed all the legal loopholes, and it is also prepared for the potential failure of the agreement between the EU and Turkey. At the Hungarian-Serbian border we are able to stop a migration flow of any size. Hungary has also taken the first steps towards elimination of the migrant business: several NGOs clearly see the migrant issue as a business issue, so we shall create conditions for the full transparency of NGOs in Hungary. In my opinion, on the whole we are moving closer to a sensible policy. Those arguments are invalid which seek to link the issue of migration to funding which European policy entitles us to. In the future I shall continue to maintain that we in the V4 must not allow ourselves to be intimidated: we must remain committed to a sensible migrant policy.

Speech after the meeting of the Visegrád Four (Warsaw, 28 March 2017), 2017

Artifacts (15)

Beria makes a good impression. He is a good organizer, an efficient, capable fun...

he former Georgian party boss, Sergo Ordzhonikidze, but writing to Lazar Kaganovich in August 1932, Stalin commented that "Beria makes a good impression. He is a good organizer, an efficient, capable...

Works Talk

These new finds tell a different story and even speak another language from all ...

eader of the Social Democrats (Marxists) in Georgia and Azerbaijan, though as the historian Bertram Wolfe noted: "These new finds tell a different story and even speak another language from all police...

Works Talk

Let our enemies know that anyone who attempts to raise a hand against the will o...

ted that more than 300 people had been arrested in Georgia in the previous few weeks. In June 1937, Beria said in a speech, "Let our enemies know that anyone who attempts to raise a hand against the...

Works Talk

According to Stalin's daughter Svetlana: He was a magnificent specimen of the a...

nted that "Beria makes a good impression. He is a good organizer, an efficient, capable functionary." According to Stalin's daughter Svetlana: He was a magnificent specimen of the artful courtier,...

Works Talk

Twenty Letters to a Friend. Hutchinson

1967
Works Talk

"11". KGB: The Inside Story (1st ed.)

1990
Works Talk

Orbán Viktor

1994

Beria: Stalin's First Lieutenant

1996
Works Talk

Russia: A Country Study. DIANE Publishing Inc

1998
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Stabiilsus Ja Õitseng: Ungaris Saavutatu Ja Ungari Ees Seisvad Väljakutsed

2001

Beria, My Father: Inside Stalin's Kremlin. Duckworth

2001
Works Talk

A történelem főutcáján: Magyarország, 1998-2002

2003

Lakoba, Stanislav

2004
Works Talk

The Cold War: a new history

2005
Works Talk

GED Social Studies. Research and Education Association

2005
Works Talk

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