László Göncz (born 13 April 1960) is a Hungarian

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...

and

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...

. He is currently serving in the

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repre ...

of the Republic of Slovenia as the official representative of the Hungarian national community in Slovenia. He was born in

Murska Sobota Murska Sobota (, Slovenian abbreviation: ''MS'' ; german: Olsnitz;''Radkersburg und Luttenberg'' (map, 1:75,000). 1894. Vienna: K.u.k. Militärgeographisches Institut. hu, Muraszombat) is a town in northeastern Slovenia. It is the centre of the ...

, then part of the

Socialist Republic of Slovenia The Socialist Republic of Slovenia ( sl, Socialistična republika Slovenija, sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Socijalistička Republika Slovenija, Социјалистичка Република Словенија), commonly referred to as Sociali ...

former Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Yu ...

. He spent his childhood in the bilingual border town of

Lendava Lendava (; formerly ''Dolnja Lendava'', in older sources also ''Dolenja Lendava''; hu, Lendva, formerly ''Alsólendva''; german: Lindau, formerly ''Unter-Limbach'') is a town in Slovenia in the region of Prekmurje. It is the seat of the Municipa ...

, where he attended elementary school. He studied history at the

University of Pécs The University of Pécs (UP; Hungarian: ''Pécsi Tudományegyetem''; PTE) is an institution of higher education in Hungary. The modern university was established in 1912 but has its roots in the medieval university founded in Pécs in 1367 by ...

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...

. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, he worked as a historian and cultural activist of the Hungarian minority in the region of

Prekmurje Prekmurje (; dialectically: ''Prèkmürsko'' or ''Prèkmüre''; hu, Muravidék) is a geographically, linguistically, culturally and ethnically defined region of Slovenia, settled by Slovenes and a Hungarian minority, lying between the Mur Ri ...

. In the Slovenian parliamentary election of 2008, he was elected to the Slovenian National Assembly in the 9th electoral unit, reserved for registered members of the Hungarian minority in Slovenia, defeating the incumbent candidate

Mária Pozsonec Mária Pozsonec (16 January 1940 – 3 April 2017) was a Slovenian politician of Hungarian ethnicity. Between 1990 and 2008, she served as representative of the Hungarian national community in the National Assembly of Slovenia. She was born ...

who had served as the representative of the Hungarian minority in the Slovenian Parliament for the past 18 years. On 4 December 2011, he defeated Dušan Orban in

2011 Slovenian parliamentary election Parliamentary elections were held in Slovenia on 4 December 2011 to elect the 90 deputies of the National Assembly. This was the first early election in Slovenia's history. The election was surprisingly won by the center-left Positive Slovenia par ...

References

External links

Interview in the weekly Mladina
{{DEFAULTSORT:Goncz, Laszlo 20th-century Slovenian historians People from Murska Sobota Slovenian people of Hungarian descent Living people Members of the National Assembly (Slovenia) 1960 births 21st-century Slovenian historians