János Esterházy

Who was János Esterházy?

Count János Esterházy was a prominent ethnic Hungarian politician in mid-war Czechoslovakia and later in the First Slovak Republic. Member of the Czechoslovak parliament and the Slovak Assembly. After war, he was illegally deported to the Soviet Union, sentenced in trumped-up trial and imprisoned. In the meantime, he was sentenced in absence to death by the National Court in Bratislava for the treason of the state, collaboration with enemy, breaking Czechoslovakia and his participation on anti-democratic regime as a deputy of the Slovak Assembly. The sentence was not executed because of presidential pardon after his return to Czechoslovakia from Soviet Union.