Ferenc biography minister

Ferenc biography minister of education.

2006 hungary protests

By Gabriel Partos
BBC European affairs analyst


Ferenc Gyurcsany is fighting for his political life

Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany has ruled out stepping down from his post since anti-government rioters in Budapest briefly occupied Hungarian national television on Monday night.

It was a typically robust response from the youthful year-old who only five months ago successfully steered his Socialist-led coalition to become the first Hungarian government to be re-elected for a second term since democratic elections were restored in

Now the controversial Mr Gyurcsany has also become the first of Hungary's post-communist prime ministers to preside over a political crisis involving violence in the streets.

The riots and the much larger peaceful demonstrations were triggered by Mr Gyurcsany's own remarks - leaked at the weekend - in which he admitted that the government had lied about the state of public finances in order to win the elections in Ap