A Romanian court annuls the result of the first round presidential election

Romania's constitutional court has annulled the results of the first round of voting in the presidential election just days before the start of the second round.

It means that the process will be restarted from the beginning, the government will decide the date of the new vote.

The first round was won by Calin Georgescu, an almost unknown Nato striker who once admired Vladimir Putin.

The court decision comes after intelligence documents were released, suggesting that Georgescu benefited from a mass influence operation – carried out abroad – to influence the outcome of the vote.

Outgoing Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu said the court's annulment decision was “the only correct solution after the classification of documents…which show that the result of the Romanian people's vote was clearly distorted due to Russian intervention”.

The judges of the court met on Friday morning, although they had announced the previous night that they would not discuss new information about possible external influence on the election until the second round of voting.

The law stipulates that, in the event of an annulment, the election must continue on the second Sunday after the date of annulment – which would mean 22 December.

However, the court decided to ask the government to re-run the entire election process, as well as the election campaign.

Last week, a court ordered a recount of votes cast in Sunday's first round following allegations that social media platform TikTok gave “special treatment” to surprise winner Calin Georgescu.

Georgescu, who did not have his own party, campaigned heavily on TikTok. The forum said it was “false that his account is treated differently than any other person”.

He won 23% of the votes, with 19% for the runner-up, Elena Lasconi, of the opposition Save Romania Union and Ciolacu of the ruling Social Democrats, who finished third.

Lasconi condemned the court's decision as “illegal” and “immoral”, saying that “today is the moment when the Romanian state trampled on democracy”.

“Whether we like it or not, from a legal and legal point of view, nine million Romanian citizens, in the country and abroad, have expressed their choice to the chosen person. We cannot ignore their will!” he said.

He was hoping to win Sunday's second round, which has been cancelled.

The Constitutional Court also rejected petitions filed by a pair of losers who accused Georgescu of illegally financing the campaign.

This week, Georgescu denied to the BBC that he was a Moscow man.

He said the political parties could not resist his success and were trying to stop him.

The country is now in a completely new place, politically. And no one is sure what comes next.