(12 May 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Bucharest, Romania – 11 May 2025
1. Top shot of crowd
2. Presidential candidate Nicusor Dan going on stage
3. Dan greeting crowd
4. SOUNDBITE (Romanian) Nicusor Dan, Romanian presidential candidate:
++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT; PART COVERED BY SHOT 5++
"We need to rebuild this country, we need to project hope. And we need, from May 19, a united Romania so that its people will be able to face the challenges inside and outside the country."
5. Large EU flag held by participants
++NIGHT SHOTS++
6. Wide of rally
7. Various of people waving phones with torches turned on
8. Top shot of crowd
STORYLINE:
Thousands of Romanians rallied in support of the pro-EU presidential candidate Nicusor Dan on Sunday, a week before he faces a hard-right nationalist front-runner in the final round of a closely watched election.
A communist country until 1989, Romania joined the EU in 2007.
But last year it was plunged into its worst political crisis in decades when a top court voided the previous election in which the far-right outsider Calin Georgescu topped the first round, following allegations of electoral violations and Russian interference, which Moscow has denied.
The rally was held a week after the first round of a presidential election redo that saw hard-right nationalist George Simion, 38, emerge as the frontrunner.
In second place was 55-year-old incumbent Bucharest Mayor Nicusor Dan.
"We need to rebuild this country, we need to project hope and we need, from May 19, a united Romania so that its people will be able to face the challenges inside and outside the country," he told the assembled crowd on Sunday.
A median of polls ahead of the runoff suggests Simion holds a lead in the vote, which will be held between the two staunchly anti-establishment candidates on May 18.
Observers have warned that the outcome could reshape the EU and NATO member country’s geopolitical direction.
Simion’s critics have long accused him of being pro-Russian and warn that his presidency would undermine both the EU and NATO as Moscow’s war drags on in Ukraine.
But in an interview with The Associated Press this week, Simion rejected the accusations, and he has said that he wants to see more power with the bloc’s individual members rather than the European institutions.
Although Simion and Dan are ideological opposites, they both made their political careers railing against Romania’s old political class, which has fallen out of favor as strong anti-establishment sentiment among voters grips the country.
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