Comment on Key figure in Hungarian democracy dies at 90

BUDAPEST, Hungary — Gyorgy Szabad, a historian who survived forced labor during the Holocaust to become the speaker of Hungary’s first post-communist Parliament, has died at age 90. Szabad’s death on Friday was announced by Parliament, where he was speaker between 1990 and 1994. No cause of death was given. Szabad, a university history professor, also played a key role in the 1989-1990 negotiations which led to the end of Hungary’s communist regime. Tributes from all sides of the political spectrum highlighted his contributions to democracy. Szabad was “one of the leading figures of national thought and the new Hungarian democracy,” said a joint statement from President Janos Ader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Parliamentary Speaker Laszlo Kover. The opposition Together party, meanwhile, said Szabad, in his role as speaker, helped ensure “that the huge political and social changes happened in the form of a peaceful transition.” Szabad was born to a Hungarian-Jewish family in Arad, Romania, on Aug.