Romania's top court overturns results of first round of presidential vote

Bucharest: The results of the first round of Romania's presidential vote were overturned on Friday by the country's highest court, according to a report by Al Jazeera.

The top court ruled that the process must be restarted following suspicions that Russia orchestrated a coordinated campaign which promoted Calin Georgescu, the far-right politician who emerged as the frontrunner.

The Constitutional Court's ruling comes after President Klaus Iohannis disclosed intelligence alleging Romania became the target of "aggressive hybrid Russian attacks" during the election season.

The alleged campaign involved several social media profiles that endorsed far-right Georgescu on platforms such as TikTok and Telegram.

The court has decided "to annul the entire electoral process for the election of the President of Romania ... to ensure the correctness and legality of the electoral process", it said in Friday's decision. "The electoral process to elect Romania's president will be fully rerun, and the government will set a new date and ... calendar for the necessary steps," the Constitutional Court said in a statement, Al Jazeera reported.

Notably, Georgescu, known for his anti-European Union and anti-NATO stance had unexpectedly surged into the lead in Romania's presidential race on November 25, raising concerns about the country's pro-Western trajectory.

With 98 per cent of ballots counted, 62-year-old Calin Georgescu held nearly 23 per cent of the vote, slightly ahead of centre-left Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, who had around 20 per cent.

Centre-right candidate Elena Lasconi trailed in third with nearly 19 per cent, followed by far-right leader George Simion with 14 per cent, Al Jazeera reported. The partial results indicate that Georgescu, who had gotten 5 per cent of the votes in the opinion polls prior to the election, is set to face Ciolacu in a run-off vote on December 8, Al Jazeera reported.

Earlier, exit polls had indicated that Ciolacu, leader of the Social Democratic Party, was leading, with Lasconi in second place, in an election focused on economic issues and the increasing cost of living.