Politics as a vocation

Four and a half decades ago, on 10 June 1979, Otto von Habsburg became a member of the first directly elected European Parliament.

“Whoever is not a good Hungarian cannot be a good European.”

On 1 May 2004, twenty years ago, Hungary became a member state of the European Union. Otto von Habsburg, who had fought throughout the years of the Cold War to reunite the continent divided by the consequences of the Second World War, saw the enlargement as a significant opportunity, offering a wealth of new prospects.