Romania election: EU breathes sigh of relief after Dan defeats far-right, pro-Russia rival
The centrist mayor of Bucharest, Nicuşor Dan, has begun sounding out Romania's political parties over forming a new majority government after winning the country's presidential election in a surprise result greeted with relief across the EU.
With all votes counted on Monday morning, Dan, who had described the second round vote as a battle between 'a pro-western and an anti-western Romania', scored 53.6%, official figures showed, against 46.4% for his far-right rival George Simion.
Dan, 55, a quietly-spoken mathematician who has been the capital's independent mayor since 2020, came from behind to win after losing heavily to Simion, a brash, EU-critical Trump admirer who had wanted to halt aid to Ukraine, in the first round.
At nearly 65%, turnout was the highest in a Romanian election for a quarter of a century, reflecting the importance of a vote with huge consequences for the country's strategic alignment and economic prospects, as well as for EU unity.
Staunchly pro-EU and pro-Nato, Dan had campaigned on a pledge to fight corruption, maintain support for neighbouring Ukraine – where Romania has played an important logistical role – and keep the country firmly within the western mainstream.
'It's a victory of thousands and thousands of people who ... believe that Romania can change in the right direction,' he told his supporters after the outcome became clear, while calling for 'hope and patience' as the country faced 'a difficult period ahead'.
Simion, a former soccer ultra and ultranationalist agitator, at first refused to concede, claiming on social media on Sunday, 'I am the new president of Romania'. But he later acknowledged Dan 'won the election, and this was the will of the Romanian people'.
The far-right candidate vowed, however, to 'continue the fight for freedom and our great values along with other patriots, sovereignists and conservatives all over the world. We may have lost a battle, but we will certainly not lose the war'.
EU leaders congratulated Dan. The European Commission's president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the result would help 'a strong Europe', while European Council president, António Costa, called it 'a strong signal of Romanians' attachment to the European project'.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said Romania had 'chosen democracy, the rule of law, and the European Union'. Ukraine's leader, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, also congratulated Dan, saying it was 'important to have Romania as a reliable partner'.
The result deprives Hungary's illiberal leader, Viktor Orbán, the EU's disrupter-in-chief, and Slovakia's Robert Fico – both of whom oppose military aid for Ukraine – of a new ally in key decisions on the war, energy, EU enlargement and the bloc's budget.
The election came nearly six months after an initial vote was annulled amid evidence of campaign finance irregularities and a 'massive' Russian interference campaign in favour of its far-right winner, Călin Georgescu, who was banned from standing again.
Simion had said that if he won he would nominate the Moscow-friendly Georgescu, who is under investigation on six counts including misreporting campaign spending, illegal use of digital technology and promoting fascist groups, as prime minister.
Cristian Preda, a professor of politics at the University of Bucharest, said the result reflected voters' concern that 'for the first time in Romania's electoral history, we had a potential president who was openly supported by Moscow'.
Preda said a clear majority of about 60% of voters were deeply disillusioned with Romania's mainstream centre-left Socials Democrats (PSD) and centre-right Liberals (PNL) – but that a similar proportion were also solidly pro-European and anti-Russian.
'Voters were faced with a choice between the positions of the Kremlin, and those of Brussels,' he said. 'Dan was pro-western and represented neither of the big parties, in an election in which security was key. For me, the result was never really in doubt.'
Dan faces a daunting in-tray and a tough challenge finding a prime minister to form a majority in parliament to reduce Romania's budget deficit – the largest in the EU – as well as to reassure investors and markets spooked by a possible Simion win.
Romanian presidents have a semi-executive role, with considerable powers over foreign policy, national security, defence spending and judicial appointments, and can also dissolve parliament if MPs reject two prime ministerial nominations.
Simion's victory in the 4 May first round triggered the collapse of Romania's PSD-PNL ruling coalition. Local media suggested Dan would first seek to form a new majority with the two main parties and a prime minister from his Save Romania Union (USR).
Failing that, he may work towards a minority coalition with the Liberals, with a confidence-and-supply arrangement with the Social Democrats. He has ruled out any cooperation with Simion's AUR party, the second largest in parliament.
The voting in Romania took place on the same day as the first round of a Polish election in which a liberal frontrunner, Rafał Trzaskowski, edged ahead of Karol Nawrocki, who was backed by the opposition nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party.
Trzaskowski did worse than expected, with final results showing he scored 31.36% to Nawrocki's 29.54%. Since Polish presidents can veto laws passed by parliament, the 1 June runoff will determine prime minister Donald Tusk's ability to push through his reformist, pro-EU agenda.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
BBC News
13 minutes ago
- BBC News
Abramovich hopes for 'proper goodbye'
Former Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich says he wants to return to Stamford Bridge for "a proper goodbye", in his first interview since sanctions forced him to sell the club in oligarch, who the UK Government allege has strong links to Russian president Vladimir Putin, has not spoken since the sale of Chelsea and his last known interview was with Forbes in March an interview in Abu Dhabi in February for the book "Sanctioned" by Nick Purewal, Abramovich ruled out re-investing in Chelsea or, indeed, any other football club. But he said he wants to return to Stamford Bridge someday. "Perhaps one day there would be a situation where I could attend a match and say a proper goodbye, but nothing more than that," he is quoted as saying. He added: "I don't have any interest in any role in a football club, certainly not a professional role."Abramovich also says he still wants a resolution to the war in Ukraine, insisting his efforts to act as a peacekeeper in talks in Turkey in 2022 were is the first time he has spoken since he sold Chelsea for £2.5bn to Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, who have overseen two underwhelming years before finishing fourth this season to qualify for the Champions League and winning the Conference League. Boehly, who also part-owns successful baseball franchise the LA Dodgers and basketball team the LA Lakers, said in the book: "If you look at our ambitions for the Dodgers and for the Lakers, you're here to win, and it's our business to win; and we're doing everything we can do to win. "Our goal with Chelsea is also to win silverware, because we know, and I know, how much it means to the fans. It makes you appreciate again that sport makes people happy, especially when you win. And Chelsea is supposed to win. "But I really believe that sustained success is an investment, and no matter what business I'm in, or any industry, there are no shortcuts."Meanwhile, Abramovich's comments have emerged just a week after the UK government threatened to sue him, with proceeds from the sale of the club still stuck in a frozen bank account. The UK government wants the money to be for Ukrainian humanitarian aid, but "all victims of the war in Ukraine".Chelsea are also under investigation by the Premier League for alleged irregular payments from Abramovich-era transfer activity.
Reuters
23 minutes ago
- Reuters
Ukrainian woman searches for husband lost in action two years ago
CHERNIHIV, Ukraine, June 10 (Reuters) - When gaunt Ukrainian soldiers dismount from buses as part of prisoner swaps with Russia, Mariia Pylnyk tries to find out anything she can about her missing husband from the freed men, and hopes, just maybe, that he will be among them. Holding up a photograph of Dmytro Pylnyk, lost in action in early 2023, she has many questions. What happened to his unit when it was ambushed by Russian forces? Was he captured by Russia? Could he eventually be released? The mass prisoner swap last month was an opportunity for people like her to ask troops just out of Russian captivity about missing loved ones who they believe, or simply hope, are prisoners of war. The alternative is unthinkable. "I hold out great hope that someone has heard something, seen something," Pylnyk, 29, told Reuters at a recent exchange in May, flanked by other relatives of those missing in action. "My son and I are waiting for (his) dad to come home. Hope dies last. God willing, it'll all be okay and dad will come back." Precise numbers for soldiers missing in action are not made public. For Ukrainians, and for Russians on the other side of the conflict, it can be hard to find out even basic information. Pylnyk says she has written to government agencies and Russian authorities and learned almost nothing. Ukrainian officials say more than 70,000 Ukrainians have been registered missing since 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion. The majority are from the military but the figure also includes civilians. Another 12,000 have been removed from the list after being identified among the dead or returned in exchanges. Petro Yatsenko, a spokesman for the Coordination Council that arranges prisoner swaps from the Ukrainian side, said Russia had never notified Kyiv which soldiers it is holding prisoner. Ukraine collects that data by other means as best it can, he said. Pylnyk and others like her share information in online chat groups and use it to try to piece together what happened. "Misfortune brought us together," she said. "After two years of this, we're like a family." Dmytro Pylnyk, an electrician by trade, was drafted into the army in late 2022. He phoned home often so that his wife did not worry but last called on their son Artem's third birthday on Feb. 27, 2023. He was deployed from Kharkiv region towards Bakhmut, a small city that later fell to Russian forces after fierce fighting. His unit's convoy was caught in a Russian ambush, Mariia Pylnyk said she had learned. "The guys ran any which way," she said, citing conversations with commanders who told her 41 soldiers were missing in action. Two were captured and have since been released. One, who was freed in an exchange at Easter and had lost both his arms, was unable to share any valuable information, she said. The second refused to talk. The pace of prisoner swaps has increased in the last month. Ukraine and Russia each released 1,000 prisoners in a three-day exchange last month, the only tangible outcome of direct talks in Istanbul. A prisoner swap of under-25s on Monday was the first in a series of exchanges also expected to include each side repatriating the remains of thousands. Mariia Pylnyk has given her son's DNA to the authorities so that if Dmytro is confirmed killed in action they will be notified. "We all understand that this is war and anything is possible. But to this day, I don't believe it and I don't feel that he is dead. I feel like he's alive and God willing he'll return," she said. She lives with Artem, now five, in Pakul, a village in the northern Chernihiv region that was briefly occupied by Russians. She has not told Artem his father is missing in action. "He knows that dad is a soldier, dad is a good man, dad is at work and just doesn't have any signal to call," she said. She takes comfort from seeing families reunited and never allows herself to cry in front of her son. She used to work in a shop, but Artem has often been ill. The angst of the last two years have taken their toll on her health too. She receives state support. Pylnyk has vowed to find her husband but has often not had time to attend prisoner swaps while looking after their son. "Only a weakling can give up, you know, throw up their hands and say that's it, he's not there," she said, adding that she was very emotional when she attended last month's big exchange. "When I was there, the fighting spirit awoke in me that I needed. I have to do this. Who else will do it but me?"
The Independent
31 minutes ago
- The Independent
Why Nato has raised the voices of doom to a scream
Nato chief Mark Rutte has called for a 400 per cent boost to air and missile capabilities – and his demand to raise defence spending across the alliance to 5 per cent has raised the voices of doom to a scream. A return to Cold War levels of defence spending is not, however, a hysterical plea from a lackey of the military-industrial complex. It is a sad acknowledgement that the peace dividend that came with the collapse of the Soviet Union has been squandered by the West in a pointless war in Afghanistan and a criminal conflict in Iraq which expanded the list of peoples with a good reason to hate democracy. But there were plenty around already. Vladimir Putin is one of them, Xi Jinping is another – Donald Trump is rushing to their ranks. Autocracy is on the rise around the world while democracies have been consumed by complacency. 'Wishful thinking will not keep us safe,' said Rutte, who called for Nato to become a 'stronger, fairer and more lethal alliance'. 'The fact is, we need a quantum leap in our collective defence. The fact is, we must have more forces and capabilities to implement our defence plans in full. 'The fact is, danger will not disappear even when the war in Ukraine ends.' He's right, of course. But he is the secretary general of a military alliance. He is banging the drum for more money because he wants to see the return to the days when MAD – mutually assured destruction – was the sword that hung over every head on the planet. In the bad old days, nuclear war was the horror that kept the peace between the superpowers. They pursued their rivalries through proxies – often in Africa. Marxist Mozambique, Angola, and Ethiopia endured civil wars for decades while Western-backed rebels battled the Moscow-backed governments from the 1960s to the 1980s. Sometimes, as in Vietnam and Korea, the West sent its forces into war – but overwhelmingly the suffering for the ideological schism that split the world was in what was then known as the Third World. In South America, CIA-backed coups removed leaders who were deemed too 'commie-inclined' by Washington where Republicans and Democrats were terrified of reds getting under beds in their back yards. Kennedy's clash with Khrushchev came close to WW3 during the Cuban Missile Crisis. But it was the ability of the West to outspend the Soviet Union that brought the Iron Curtain down on the Soviet empire. The Soviets spent between 10 and 20 per cent of GDP on the military while Nato was spending half that. Moscow depended on high oil prices for its economic wellbeing while its collectivisation of farming and industrial policies stifled innovation. When oil crashed from $120/barrel to the mid $20s/barrel in the 1980s, the social and political necessity for reform became overwhelming. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Russia is estimated to spend at least 7.2 per cent of its GDP on the military, but this does not account for social welfare payments or the costs of administering the occupied territories in Ukraine. A cheap option for Putin in splitting the attention of the West has been to encourage semi-autonomous private military companies to operate in north Africa – like the proxies of the Cold War. Groups like Wagner have expanded their operations in Mali, Niger, from the Sahel to Khartoum, drawing resources and focus away from Ukraine. But in Europe, Rutte said, Nato seems to be no match for Russia. 'Our militaries also need thousands more armoured vehicles and tanks, millions more artillery shells, and we must double our enabling capabilities, such as logistics, supply, transportation and medical support,' he said. Cuts in military spending after the Cold War ended were based on the assumption that a Western-style way of life would be adopted in Russia. But the country largely fell into gangsterism and is seen by many there to have been rescued by Putin's more organised oligarchic kleptocracy underpinned by vigorous Soviet-style fear and denunciation of 'the West'. It may be a Moscow myth that Nato covets the Russian Federation but it is one that is believed widely in Putin's realm. That the West is somehow always going to be safe for democracy is an equally dangerous delusion, Rutte suggested. 'Wishful thinking will not keep us safe. We cannot dream away the danger… Hope is not a strategy. So Nato has to become a stronger, fairer and more lethal alliance.' In the UK, Keir Starmer has committed to spend 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product on defence from April 2027, with a goal of increasing that to 3 per cent over the next parliament – a timetable which could stretch to 2034. But this is well short of what is needed, according to the Nato chief. Rutte's visit to the UK comes after he proposed members of the bloc spend 5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) on defence as part of a strengthened investment plan for the alliance. The target would require nations to raise core defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP, with the remaining 1.5 per cent to be made up of 'defence-related expenditure'. Nato leaders will meet in the Hague later this month, when the 5 per cent spending target by 2035 will be discussed. The leaders gathered will all agree that more must be spent. Few, if any, will know how to sell that idea to their voters.
