Arpad Goncz, Hungary's first post-Communist president, dies at 93

Former Hungarian President Arpad Goncz waves from his balcony as hundreds of people greet him on his 90th birthday in Budapest, February 10, 2012. REUTERS/Laszlo Balogh

Arpad Goncz, who was jailed after the country's failed 1956 uprising against Soviet rule and went on to become its first post-Soviet president, died on Tuesday at 93, after what he had called a somewhat "grotesque and surreal" life of constant new beginnings.

The soft-spoken, grandfatherly Goncz, Hungary's most popular politician, held the largely ceremonial presidency for two terms, from 1990 to 2000, as Hungary shifted to a market economy and charted a path into NATO and the European Union.