{"id":5079,"date":"2025-05-20T09:01:11","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T09:01:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=5079"},"modified":"2025-05-20T09:01:11","modified_gmt":"2025-05-20T09:01:11","slug":"russian-officials-question-romanian-presidential-elections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=5079","title":{"rendered":"Russian officials question Romanian presidential elections"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Russian ambassador to Romania, Vladimir Lipaev, recently alleged that France had interference in Romania\u2019s presidential elections, echoing far-right defeated presidential candidate George Simion<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Lipaev said on the \u201cRossia 24\u201d television channel that \u201cthere was interference in the elections at the level of Macron. This is indisputable, because literally two days before the elections, Macron was actively communicating with Nicu\u0219or Dan and expressed his full support and solidarity,\u201d according to G4Media<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In fact, the Romanian candidate spoke on the phone<\/a> with the French president shortly before the second round. During the call, Macron praised France and Romania’s profound relations and said that \u201cwhat is at stake in these elections is of course the key to not only Romania\u2019s destiny, but also ours.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

In February, French president Emmanuel Macron said that Russia manipulated elections in Romania and that the cancellation of last year’s presidential elections<\/a> did not shock him as a result of that intervention.<\/p>\n

Similarly to Lipaev, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov weighed in on Romania\u2019s presidential race, saying the pro-Russian candidate who won an aborted vote last year had been unfairly disqualified.<\/p>\n

“The elections were strange, to say the least,” he said, as quoted by Reuters<\/a>. \u201cWe know the story of the candidate who had the best chance of winning. Without bothering to find any justification, he was simply forcibly removed from the race.”<\/p>\n

Russia has previously denied any role in Calin Georgescu’s campaign, and accused Romanian authorities of barring him for political reasons. However, both the Romanian Intelligence Service, as well as intelligence agencies from Italy and France, and the Deputy Secretary General of NATO have officially announced that they have evidence of Russia\u2019s meddling<\/a> in the Romanian campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The latest interference by Russia in Romania\u2019s elections occurred on election day itself. The founder of Telegram, Russian-born Pavel Durov, claimed<\/a> that a French intelligence service allegedly asked him to limit the activity of conservative voices in Romania before the elections. The French intelligence service immediately reacted and announced that it had in fact asked Durov to ensure that Telegram no longer allowed child pornography and terrorist threats. Durov is already being investigated by French authorities for these crimes.<\/p>\n

The victory of pro-EU centrist Nicusor Dan is being labeled as a blow to Russian interests in the region. Runner-up George Simion had pledged to end military aid to Ukraine, and promised to be an opponent to deeper EU integration and cooperation. Before the second round of voting, Simion<\/a> had also said that Macron had \u201cdictatorial tendencies.\u201d<\/p>\n

radu@romania-insider.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

(Photo source:\u00a0Inquam Photos | Alex Nicodim and Russian Foreign Ministry on Facebook)<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Russian ambassador to Romania, Vladimir Lipaev, recently alleged that France had interference in Romania\u2019s presidential elections, echoing far-right defeated presidential candidate George Simion. Lipaev said on the \u201cRossia 24\u201d television channel that \u201cthere was interference in the elections at the level of Macron. This is indisputable, because literally two days before the elections, Macron […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5079\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}