Romania: Top court annuls presidential election results

Romania's constitutional court on Friday annulled   the results of the first round of the country's presidential election, when far-right populist Calin Georgescu emerged as the surprise front-runner.

This follows President Klaus Iohannis earlier in the week declassifying Romanian intelligence that alleges major Russian-backed promotion of Georgescu on social media sites like TikTok and Telegram.

Georgescu had been set to go up against centrist Elena Lasconi this weekend in the second-round runoff.

"The electoral process to elect Romania's president will be fully re-run, and the government will set a new date and ... calendar for the necessary steps," the court said in a statement on Friday.

The court said its decision was "seeking to ensure the fairness and legality of the electoral process," and that a lengthier explanation would be published later. The court had previously validated the result of the first round on Monday, prior to the intelligence release.

President Iohannis' term expires on December 21, but on Friday he announced that he will stay on the job until a new president is elected.

Meanwhile, in a written statement released to broadcaster Realitatea TV, Georgescu denounced the top court's ruling by calling it "a coup d'etat."

"Our democracy is under attack," Georgescu said, calling on Romanians to "remain faithful to our common ideal."

Sudden surge for Putin proponent baffled observers

Georgescu, an independent candidate who declared zero campaign spending, was polling in single digits soon before the election, but surged to just under 23% of the vote. 

Lasconi was next on just over 19%. Turnout was low, as usual in Romania, at 52%.

Romanian authorities declassified intelligence on Wednesday alleging "aggressive hybrid Russian attacks," saying there were coordinated campaigns on influential accounts on TikTok and Telegram to promote Georgescu. 

Romania is both an EU and NATO member. Georgescu had called to cut all support for Ukraine and spoken in support of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The EU said on Friday that it had sent an urgent request to TikTok for more information.  

Parliamentary election results stand, with vote spread thin

Romania also voted in parliamentary elections at the weekend, but the court has not called their integrity into question. 

In that vote, the center-left Social Democrats, or PSD, claimed more seats than any other bloc, despite losing ground from their 2020 performance with just under 22%.

The PSD candidate, Marcel Ciolacu, finished an unexpected third in the first round presidential poll and so would have missed out on Sunday's runoff. 

Romania's more mainstream conservative party, the National Liberal Party or PNL, also fared far worse than it had four years ago. 

In the place of the struggling PSD and PNL, far-right parties made major gains, including the new group SOS Romania and the longerstanding nationalist faction the Alliance for the Union of Romanians, AUR. 

Georgescu, the surprise first-round winner, was a leading member of AUR until the party expelled him for being too radical, after his praise for a Romanian fascist movement during World War II. 

msh/ab (AP, Reuters)