POPE Francis will visit Hungary from April 28 to 30, where he will meet Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the Vatican said today.  

Francis, who regularly champions the rights of refugees, will sit down in Budapest with the far-right Orban, who portrays himself as the defender of Christian Europe against migrants.  

The pope will also meet with poor people, young people and refugees, according to a programme released by the Vatican.  

It will be the 86-year-old pope’s second visit to the predominantly Catholic country in two years.  

He made a one-day visit to the country in September 2021, spending just seven hours in the country to preside over a mass and meet privately with Orban.  

Francis then received Orban for the first time at the Vatican a few months later, in April 2022.  

During the private audience, he reportedly thanked the Hungarian leader for the protection his country offered to refugees fleeing the war in neighbouring Ukraine.