Romanian court throws out challenge to result of presidential election
Romania's Constitutional Court threw out the challenge to the election result by Simion, who accused foreign states, including France, of vote-buying and alleging ballot fraud involving some of Nicusor's votes.
In a unanimous decision, the judges ruled Simion's request to annul the election was "unfounded" because the presidential poll complied with all "procedures within the scope of its authority," the court said.
If they had made that ruling after the first election, the second would have been unnecessary.
Simion, leader of the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians party, attacked the decision, calling it a "coup" and urged his supporters to fight on.
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Dan, who is an independent, condemned Simion's legal challenge as trumped up, saying "it was clear from the beginning to everyone that it was completely artificial."
The strategically key European Union country and NATO ally has been in unprecedented territory since the court annulled a presidential election in December, two days before a run-off between centrist Elena Lasconi and previously unknown far-right candidate Calin Georgescu, citing Russian interference.
Simion polled 40.96% of the vote in the rerun of the election earlier this month -- short of the 50% needed for an outright win -- but was expected to prevail over Dan in Sunday's run-off because the mayor received half as many votes.
Simion has previously argued against military assistance for Ukraine in its struggle to repel invading Russian forces and in favor of a return to the Greater Romania of the interwar years by reunifying Romania with neighboring Romanian-speaking Moldova.
Simion received a three-year entry ban from Ukraine in 2024 for "systematic anti-Ukrainian" activities and is also banned from neighboring Moldova on national security grounds.
The constitutional court's decision to annul "the entire electoral process" came after declassified Romanian intelligence files detailed a security services warning that Russia had attacked the election system with an "aggressive hybrid action" in order to promote Georgescu.
The intelligence assessment was that Georgescu's victory was "not a natural outcome," and that a "state actor" had enabled him to leap ahead of Lasconi and Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu with an artificially coordinated social media campaign run from 25,000 TikTok accounts activated just two weeks before the first-round vote.
Condemning the alleged Russian interference, then-U.S. President Joe Biden said it was critical that Romanians had confidence their elections reflected the democratic will of the people "free of foreign malign influence aimed at undermining the fairness of their elections."
Germany’s military told to be fully equipped with weapons by 2029
Germany’s Chief of Defence, Carsten Breuer, has ordered the German military to be fully equipped with weapons and other material by 2029, a document seen by Reuters on Sunday shows.
By 2029, Russia may have reconstituted its forces sufficiently to attack NATO territory, according to estimates by Breuer and other senior military officials at NATO.
The latest document, entitled “Directive Priorities for the Bolstering of Readiness”, which Breuer signed on May 19, said Germany will meet the goal with the help of funds made available by the loosening of the country’s debt brake in March.
The defence ministry in Berlin did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In the directive, Breuer sets priorities for the weapons that should be acquired or developed most urgently, reflecting in part priorities NATO has previously laid out.
Among them, Breuer lists the strengthening of Germany’s depleted air defences, in particular with a view to intercepting drones.
Last year, sources told Reuters that NATO will request Berlin to at least quadruple its air defences, ranging from systems with a longer range, such as the Patriot, to short-range systems.
Another priority is a capability to launch deep precision strikes, according to the document, effectively hitting targets at a distance of more than 500 kilometres (310 miles) and far behind enemy lines.
In addition to pushing for Germany’s ammunition stocks to be replenished, Breuer also orders Germany to raise its stockpiling targets for all types of ammunition.
Other priorities listed in the document are the swift expansion of Germany’s capabilities in electronic warfare and the establishment of a resilient system of “offensive and defensive capabilities” in space.
In a speech in mid-May, Army Chief Alfons Mais said a large-scale social and industrial mobilisation meant Russian forces were rapidly gaining firepower.
“From 2029, at the latest, the Russian forces will be capable of a conventional aggression against NATO territory on a large scale,” he said. “But they can start testing us much sooner.”
No estimates yet on how many trillions of Euros this will cost German taxpayers, but one thing is for sure, it won't cost migrants in Germany who are living happily on welfare, a deutschemark.
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