President Mary McAleese will visit Hungary this weekend to help the country mark the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution.
The three-week uprising was a nationwide revolt against the authoritarian communist government and its Soviet-imposed policies.
Mary McAleese will attend an official welcome ceremony, gala cultural performance and dinner on Sunday hosted by President Laszlo Solyom and Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany.
On Monday the head of state will lay a white rose at the Memorial of Victims in Kossuth Square.
The president will also be present at a reading of the Budapest '56 Freedom Declaration in the Hungarian Parliament.
Mrs McAleese, who will travel with her husband, Dr Martin McAleese, will also attend a reception for the Irish community in Hungary before returning to Dublin on Monday evening. Hungary jointed the EU with nine other countries on May 1st, 2004.
The revolution began on October 23rd, 1956, as a student demonstration but spread quickly across Hungary and ousted political leaders.
The newly installed government withdrew from the pro-Soviet Warsaw Pact and pledged to hold free elections.
PA