BUCHAREST, Romania: A little-known, far-right populist took the lead in Romania’s presidential election Sunday, electoral data showed, and will likely face leftist Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu in a runoff in two weeks, an outcome that rocked the country’s political landscape.
Calin Georgescu, who ran independently, led the polls with around 22 percent of the vote, while Ciolacu of the Social Democratic Party, or PSD, trailed at 20 percent. Elena Lasconi of the Save Romania Union party, or USR, stood at about 18 percent, and George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians, or AUR, took 14.1 percent.
After polls closed, 9.4 million people — about 52.4 percent of eligible voters — had cast ballots, according to the Central Election Bureau. The second round of the vote will be held Dec. 8.
Thirteen candidates ran for the presidency in the European Union and NATO member country. The president serves a five-year term and has significant decision-making powers in areas such as national security, foreign policy and judicial appointments.
Georgescu, 62, ran independently and was not widely known. He outperformed most local surveys, sending shockwaves through Romania’s political establishment as he ascended to poll position.
After casting his ballot on Sunday, Georgescu said in a post on Facebook that he voted “For the unjust, for the humiliated, for those who feel they do not matter and actually matter the most … the vote is a prayer for the nation.”
Cristian Andrei, a political consultant based in Bucharest, told The Associated Press that Georgescu’s unexpected poll performance appears to be a “large protest or revolt against the establishment.”
“The mainstream political parties have lost the connection with regular Romanians,” he said. “You don’t have strong candidates or strong leaders … there are weak candidates, weak leaders, and the parties in general are pretty much disconnected.”
Georgescu lacks an agenda, Andrei added, and has a vague and populist manifesto with positions that are “beyond the normal discourse.” His stances include supporting Romanian farmers, reducing dependency on imports, and ramping up energy and food production.
According to his website, Georgescu holds a doctorate in pedology, a branch of soil science, and held different positions in Romania’s environment ministry in the 1990s. Between 1999 and 2012, he was a representative for Romania on the national committee of the United Nations Environment Program.
Videos posted to his popular TikTok account, where he has amassed 1.6 million likes, depict him attending church, doing judo, running around an oval track, and speaking on podcasts.
Ahead of Sunday’s vote, many had expected to see Simion, a vocal supporter of US President-elect Donald Trump, face Ciolacu in the second round. He campaigned for reunification with Moldova, which this year renewed a five-year ban on him entering the country over security concerns, and he is banned for the same reason from neighboring Ukraine.
Ecaterina Nawadia, a 20-year-old architecture student, said she voted for the first time in a national election on Sunday and hoped young people turn out in high numbers.
“Since the (1989) revolution, we didn’t have a really good president,” she said. “I hope most of the people my age went to vote … because the leading candidate is not the best option.”
Romania will also hold parliamentary elections on Dec. 1 that will determine the country’s next government and prime minister.
As the ballots were still being counted, Simion said he congratulated Georgescu and that he was “Very happy that approximately 40 percent of the votes of Romanians went toward the sovereign option” and would be in the second round.
Andrei, the political consultant, said Romania’s large budget deficit, high inflation, and an economic slowdown could push more mainstream candidates to shift toward populist stances amid widespread dissatisfaction.
Ciolacu told the AP before the first-round vote that one of his biggest goals was “to convince Romanians that it is worth staying at home or returning” to Romania, which has a massive diaspora spread throughout EU countries.
Other candidates included former NATO deputy general secretary Mircea Geoana, who ran independently and obtained about 6 percent; and Nicolae Ciuca, a former army general and head of the center-right National Liberal Party, which is currently in a tense coalition with the PSD — who stood at 9.3 percent.
Geoana, a former foreign minister and ambassador to the United States, told the AP before Sunday’s vote that he believed his international experience would qualify him above the other candidates.
Lasconi, a former journalist and the leader of the USR, said she sees corruption as one of the biggest problems Romania faces and that she supports increased defense spending and continued aid to Ukraine.
Far-right populist surprises in Romanian presidential election appearing set to enter runoff
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Far-right populist surprises in Romanian presidential election appearing set to enter runoff
- Thirteen candidates ran for the presidency in the European Union and NATO member country.
- Hard-right Georgescu has questioned NATO commitment to collective defense
Mali’s army claims arrest of Daesh group leader
BAMAKO: Mali’s army said Saturday its forces had arrested two men, one of them a leading figure in the Sahel branch of the Daesh group.
The army announced they had also killed several of the group’s fighters during an operation in the north of the country.
A statement from the army said they had arrested “Mahamad Ould Erkehile alias Abu Rakia,” as well as “Abu Hash,” who they said was a leading figure in the group.
They blamed him for coordinating atrocities against people in the Menaka and Gao regions in the northeast of the country, as well as attacks against the army.
Mali has faced profound unrest since 2012 linked both to militants associated with Al-Qaeda and the Daesh group, and to local criminal gangs.
The country’s military rulers have broken ties with former colonial power France and turned, militarily and politically, to Russia.
Iran protests Afghan dam project in new water dispute
- The dam in Herat province will store approximately 54 million cubic meters of water, irrigate 13,000 hectares of agricultural land and generate two megawatts of electricity
TEHRAN: Iran’s foreign ministry said on Friday that an upstream dam being built by neighboring Afghanistan on the Harirud River restricts water flow and could be in violation of bilateral treaties.
Water rights have long been a source of friction in ties between the two countries, which share a more than 900-kilometer (560-mile) border.
Esmaeil Baqaei, spokesman for Tehran’s foreign ministry, voiced on Friday “strong protest and concern over the disproportionate restriction of water entering Iran” due to the Pashdan Dam project.
He said in a statement that the Iranian concerns had been communicated “in contact with relevant Afghan authorities.”
“Exploitation of water resources and basins cannot be carried out without respecting Iran’s rights in accordance with bilateral treaties or applicable customary principles and rules, as well as the important principle of good neighborliness and environmental considerations,” Baqaei added.
Abdul Ghani Baradar, Afghanistan’s deputy prime minister for economic affairs, said in a video statement last month that the Pashdan project was “nearing completion and water storage has commenced.”
According to the video, the dam in Herat province will store approximately 54 million cubic meters of water, irrigate 13,000 hectares of agricultural land and generate two megawatts of electricity.
In April, Baradar said the dam was a “vital and strategic project” for Herat province.
The foreign ministry statement on Friday follows remarks by an Iranian water official, similarly criticizing the dam construction.
“The situation has led to social and environmental issues, particularly affecting the drinking water supply for the holy city of Mashhad,” Iran’s second-largest and home to a revered Shiite Muslim shrine near the Afghan border, national water industry spokesman Issa Bozorgzadeh was quoted as saying on Monday by official news agency IRNA.
Harirud River, also known as Hari and Tejen, flows from the mountains of central Afghanistan to Turkmenistan, passing along Iran’s borders with both countries.
In his statement, Baqaei said Iran expects “Afghanistan... to cooperate in continuing the flow of water from border rivers” and to “remove the obstacles created” along their path.
In May 2023, Iran issued a stern warning to Afghan officials over another dam project, on the Helmand River, saying that it violates the water rights of residents of Sistan-Baluchistan, a drought-hit province in southeastern Iran.
Series of Ethiopia earthquakes trigger evacuations
- The earthquakes have damaged houses and threatened to trigger a volcanic eruption of the previously dormant Mount Dofan, near Segento in the northeast Afar region
ADDIS ABABA: Evacuations were underway in Ethiopia Saturday after a series of earthquakes, the strongest of which, a 5.8-magnitude jolt, rocked the remote north of the Horn of Africa nation.
The quakes were centered on the largely rural Afar, Oromia and Amhara regions after months of intense seismic activity.
No casualties have been reported so far.
Ethiopia’s government Communication Service said around 80,000 people were living in the affected regions and the most vulnerable were being moved to temporary shelters.
“The earthquakes are increasing in terms of magnitude and recurrences,” it said in a statement, adding that experts had been dispatched to assess the damage.
The Ethiopian Disaster Risk Management Commission said 20,573 people had been evacuated to safer areas in Afar and Oromia, from a tally of over 51,000 “vulnerable” people.
Plans were underway to move more than 8,000 people in Oromia “in the coming days,” the agency said in a statement.
The latest shallow 4.7 magnitude quake hit just before 12:40 p.m. (0940 GMT) about 33 kilometers north of Metehara town in Oromia, according to the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center.
The earthquakes have damaged houses and threatened to trigger a volcanic eruption of the previously dormant Mount Dofan, near Segento in the northeast Afar region.
The crater has stopped releasing plumes of smoke, but nearby residents have left their homes in panic.
Earthquakes are common in Ethiopia due to its location along the Great Rift Valley, one of the world’s most seismically active areas.
Experts have said the tremors and eruptions are being caused by the expansion of tectonic plates under the Great Rift Valley.
Jimmy Carter’s 6-day funeral begins with a motorcade through south Georgia
- A motorcade with Carter’s flag-draped casket is heads to his hometown of Plains
- The 39th US president died at his home on Dec. 29 at the age of 100
PLAINS, Georgia: Jimmy Carter ‘s long public goodbye began Saturday in south Georgia where the 39th US president’s life began more than 100 years ago.
A motorcade with Carter’s flag-draped casket is heading to his hometown of Plains and past his boyhood home on the way to Atlanta. The procession began at the Phoebe Sumter Medical Center in Americus, where former Secret Service agents who protected the late president served as pallbearers. A mournful train whistle filled the clear air as the pallbearers turned to face the hearse for a final goodbye, their hands on their hearts.
The Carter family, including the former president’s four children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, are accompanying their patriarch as his six-day state funeral begins.
The longest-lived US president, Carter died at his home in Plains on Dec. 29 at the age of 100.
Families lined the procession route in downtown Plains, near the historic train depot where Carter headquartered his presidential campaign. Some carried bouquets of flowers or wore commemorative pins bearing Carter’s photo.
“We want to pay our respects,” said 12-year-old Will Porter Shelbrock, who was born more than three decades after Carter left the White House in 1981. “He was ahead of his time on what he tried to do and tried to accomplish.”
It was Shelbrock’s idea to make the trip to Plains from Gainesville, Florida, with his grandmother, Susan Cone, 66, so they could witness the start of Carter’s final journey. Shelbrock said he admires Carter for his humanitarian work building houses and waging peace, and for installing solar panels on the White House.
Carter and his late wife Rosalynn, who died in November 2023, were born in Plains and lived most of their lives in and around the town, with the exceptions of Jimmy’s Navy career and his terms as Georgia governor and president.
The procession will stop in front of Carter’s home on his family farm just outside of Plains. The National Park Service will ring the old farm bell 39 times to honor his place as the 39th president. Carter’s remains then will proceed to Atlanta for a moment of silence in front of the Georgia Capitol and a ceremony at the Carter Presidential Center.
There, he will lie in repose until Tuesday morning, when he will be transported to Washington to lie in state at the US Capitol. His state funeral is Thursday at 10 a.m. at Washington National Cathedral, followed by a return to Plains for an invitation-only funeral at Maranatha Baptist Church.
He will be buried near his home, next to Rosalynn Carter.
Gunmen from Nigeria kill five Cameroonian soldiers, MP says
YAOUNDE: Gunmen from Nigeria have killed at least five Cameroonian soldiers and wounded several others in the village of Bakinjaw on Cameroon’s border with Nigeria, a member of parliament for the district and a traditional leader said on Saturday.
It is the latest in a series of attempts to seize territory in the area.
Aka Martin Tyoga, MP for the district of Akwaya in southwestern Cameroon, where the incident took place, told Reuters the attack happened early on Friday, when hundreds of armed Fulani herdsmen crossed the border from Taraba state in Nigeria to attack a military post.
He said it was a retaliation after Cameroonian soldiers killed several herdsmen the day before.
Agwa Linus, traditional ruler of Bakinjaw, said the attackers also burnt down his home.
“This is not the first time they are attacking — it’s very unfortunate,” he said.
