A group of 50 middle school students from southwest China's quake-hit Sichuan Province arrived in Budapest Monday for recuperation in Hungary, at the invitation of the Hungarian government.

Receiving the students at the Ferihergy Airport in Budapest were Kuti Laszlo, deputy director of the Asia-Pacific Affairs Department of the Hungarian Foreign Ministry, Zhang Chunxiang, Chinese Ambassador to Hungary, and other officials from both countries.

Speaking to reporters at the airport, Kuti said that the Chinese students will spend three weeks recuperating in Budapest and the resort town of Zanka on the picturesque Balaton Lake in southwestern Hungary.

Also speaking to reporters, Sun Ling, leader of the group of Chinese students, said that the students, aged between 13 and 16 years old, were all from Dujiangyan and Pengzhou Cities of Sichuan, which were hit the hardest in the May 12 devastating earthquake.

In the magnitude-8 earthquake, some of the students lost their only parent, with both their homes and schools totally destroyed, according to Sun.

(Xinhua News Agency August 5, 2008)