Budapest hosts wine festival

The Budapest Wine Festival kicked off here on Thursday, welcoming wine-lovers from around the world until Sunday.

"This year, the winemakers and wines of the Eger (eastern Hungary) wine region will be in the focus of the event, but producers from 19 other wine regions will also be represented," Zoltan Zilai, managing director of the organizing Hungarian Viti and Viniculture Nonprofit Ltd., said before the start of the event.

"Each year, the 'Wine University'lecture and tasting series deals with a current topic. This year the members of the newly founded Eger Wine Workshop will give lectures for the interested audience," he said.

"On Thursday, we have light music, on Friday we will focus on world music, on Saturday we will have the Hungarian jazz day, and on Sunday folk music," he said.

The Budapest Wine Festival hosts hundreds of exhibitors and attracts tens of thousands of visitors every year to the UNESCO World Heritage site of Buda Castle.

Premium local and foreign wines, exciting professional and cultural programs, and the openness of visitors all contribute to the success of the event.

The festival is one of the many reasons why Budapest has been voted as the most livable eastern European city by the Economist Intelligence Unit, the Hungarian government said in a statement published here on Thursday.

"The list includes the 140 most livable cities based on 30 criteria grouped in five categories -- stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure," the statement recalls.

Scoring just over 90 points out of a possible 100, Budapest took the lead over Prague and Moscow.