Voting begins in high-stakes Hungarian election

Hungarians go to the polls in a vote that could end Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s 16 years in power, and have profound implications for the country, and wider Europe. Opposition leader Péter Magyar, who formed a grassroots party after splitting from the ruling Fidesz party, has emerged as the biggest threat to Mr Orbán’s leadership.

Also in the programme: NASA has welcomed home the four Artemis II astronauts at a special reception in Houston; and we speak to two members of the legendary British rock band Deep Purple, after they met with a long-time superfan, Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

Presenter Julian Worricker is joined by Nina dos Santos, journalist, broadcaster and a director at the Freuds communications agency in London, and Ricardo Avelar, a journalist from El Salvador who fled the country and has been based in the UK for the past two years.

(Photo: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his wife Aniko Levai vote during the Hungarian parliamentary election in Budapest, Hungary, April 12, 2026. Credit: Bernadett Szabo/REUTERS)