BUCHAREST, Romania — Romanian centrist and leftist parties looked to have fended off a surge by the nationalist right in Sunday’s parliamentary election, as attention turned to a top court ruling later on Monday on whether to annul the results of a presidential vote. 

Romania, a European Union and NATO member, was thrown into turmoil by a shock result in the first round of the presidential vote on Nov. 24. A little-known far-right candidate surged to victory, raising suspicions of outside meddling in the electoral process of a country that has been a staunch ally of Ukraine. 

Romania’s Constitutional Court ordered a recount of the first round vote and is due to announce at 1500 GMT its decision on whether or not to validate the results of the ballot. 

If the court approves the result, independent far-right candidate, Calin Georgescu will face center-right contender Elena Lasconi in a run-off vote on Dec. 8. 

Romanian authorities say the country is a key target for hostile actors such as Russia, and have accused video streaming platform TikTok of giving preferential treatment to one candidate. Both Russia and TikTok deny any wrongdoing. 

Sunday’s parliamentary election, the second of three ballots scheduled over a period of as many weeks, saw the ruling leftist Social Democrat (PSD) party come first, setting the stage for what is likely to be a period of coalition forming with centrist parties. 

“We want a coalition that will continue Romania’s European course,” Social Democrat Vice President Victor Negrescu was quoted as saying by the website of Stirile Pro TV.  

“We expect the democratic, pro-European parties to understand that the Social Democratic Party can be the balancing factor around which a future majority can be formed.” 

President’s role 

With 99.78% of votes counted in the parliamentary ballot, the PSD won 22.4% of votes, ahead of the hard-right Alliance for Uniting Romanians with 18.2%.  

Lasconi’s centrist opposition Save Romania Union (USR) had 12.2%, while the junior ruling coalition ally Liberals had 14.3%. Two far-right groupings, SOS and POT, had 7.7% and 6.3%, respectively, and the ethnic Hungarian Party UDMR 6.4%. 

Liberal leader Ilie Bolojan said the party was “willing to participate in… a coalition so that we can be a modernizing factor for our country.” 

However, who gets to form the government will ultimately depend on who wins the presidential race, since the president designates a prime minister, and the timeline for that is unclear. 

This means Georgescu could potentially be in a position to give far-right parties, who together won over 30% of the vote, the chance to form a government. 

The leader of the far-right SOS grouping, Diana Sosoaca, appealed for unity among the nationalist parties. 

“I call on all patriotic, sovereigntist, nationalist forces to come together and form a nationalist government, even a minority one,” she was quoted as saying by the website of Digi 24 TV.  

 
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BERLIN — Workers at nine Volkswagen car and component plants across Germany will strike for several hours on Monday, IG Metall union said, bringing assembly lines to a halt as labor and management clash over the future of the carmaker’s German operations.

Thousands are expected to gather at the carmaker’s headquarters in Wolfsburg. Demonstrations are also expected at the Hanover plant, which employs around 14,000 people, and other component and auto plants including Emden, Salzgitter, and Brunswick.

The strikes, which could escalate into 24-hour or unlimited strikes if a deal is not struck in the next round of wage negotiations, will put a dent in Volkswagen’s output at a time when the carmaker is already facing declining deliveries and plunging profit.

“How long and how intensive this confrontation needs to be is Volkswagen’s responsibility at the negotiating table,” Groeger said on Sunday.

A company spokesperson on Sunday said the carmaker respected workers’ right to strike and had taken steps to ensure a basic level of supplies to customers and minimize the strike’s impact.

The union last week proposed measures it said would save $1.6 billion, including forgoing bonuses for 2025 and 2026, which Europe’s top carmaker dismissed.

Volkswagen has demanded a 10% wage cut, arguing it needs to slash costs and boost profit to defend market share.

The company is also threatening to close plants in Germany, a first in its 87-year history.

An agreement not to stage walkouts ended on Saturday, enabling workers to carry out strikes from Sunday across VW AG’s German plants.

The labor union called on employees of the plants housed under subsidiary Volkswagen Sachsen GmbH, which include VW’s EV-only plant Zwickau, to strike on both Monday and Tuesday.

Negotiations will continue on Dec. 9 over a new labor agreement, with unions vowing to resist any proposals that do not provide a long-term plan for every VW plant.
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TBILISI, Georgia — Police in Georgia fired water cannon and tear gas to disperse protesters in Tbilisi, the capital, who opposed the government’s decision to suspend talks on joining the European Union, while some were detained, Russian agencies said on Monday.

Thousands of protesters had taken to the streets for several days in the nation of 3.7 million, accusing the ruling Georgian Dream party of pursuing increasingly authoritarian, anti-Western and pro-Russian policies.

Police ended hours of standoff early on Monday by moving demonstrators away from the parliament building and down the central Rustaveli Avenue towards the Tbilisi opera house and began erecting barricades with any material they could find.

Amid skirmishes with police, the demonstrators were forced off the avenue as they tossed fireworks at law enforcement officers, who responded with volleys of water cannon and tear gas, Russian agencies said.

After months of rising tension, the crisis has worsened since Thursday’s announcement that the government would freeze EU talks for four years, with pro-EU demonstrators facing off against police.

It was not immediately clear how many protesters were detained early on Monday, when Russia’s Interfax news agency said only a small group was left near a metro station.

It said 113 police officers were injured during the Tbilisi protests of the last few days, citing the Georgian interior (home) ministry.

On Sunday, four opposition groups urged protesters to demand paid leave from their jobs in order to attend protests, as provided by labor law, and asked employers to permit time off.

Georgia’s pro-Western President Salome Zourabichvili called for pressure to be brought on the Constitutional Court to annul elections last month won by Georgian Dream. Both the opposition and Zourabichvili say the poll was rigged.

The European Union and the United States said they were alarmed by what they see as Georgia’s shift away from a pro-Western path back towards Russia’s orbit.

Georgian Dream says it is acting to defend the country’s sovereignty against outside interference.
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Madrid — A bus crashed Sunday evening near a ski resort in southern France, killing at least two people and injuring 33 others, local authorities said.

A total of 47 people including the driver were on the bus when it crashed near the Porte-Puymorens ski resort, the regional administration said. Seven people were in critical condition.

Local authorities said a preliminary investigation showed the bus ran into a cliff, but the exact circumstances that may have resulted in such a collision were not immediately clear.

Images released by the local firefighter service showed the bus pressed against the side of a cliff, its right side partially crushed, and the windshield was apparently knocked out.

More than 120 individuals were involved in the high-altitude rescue effort, including from neighboring Catalonia in Spain and Andorra. Four rescue helicopters were also deployed to the accident scene some 2,000 meters (6,500 feet) in the French Pyrenees mountains.

Catalonia’s emergency services said on social media platform X, formerly Twitter, that the bus originated from L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, outside Barcelona, Spain.

A holiday center in Porte-Puymorens resort was opened to house the surviving passengers. The local ski resort has not opened yet because of a lack of snow.

Some information for this report came from Agence France-Presse.
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The late American businessman Morgan Williams was deeply involved in promoting Ukrainian business as president of the US-Ukraine Business Council.  During his time in Ukraine, Williams began collecting artwork related to the Holodomor, a famine engineered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in the early 1930’s that killed millions. Now, all that artwork has a home. Hanna Tverdokhlib has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. VOA footage by Kostiantyn Golubchyk.
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Athens, Greece — Torrential rains flooded homes, businesses and roads in the popular Greek tourist island of Rhodes on Sunday, forcing authorities to temporarily ban the use of vehicles as Storm Bora pounded the country for a second day.

On Saturday, a man died in flash floods which hit another Greek island in the northern Aegean.

The fire service received more than 650 calls to pump water out of flooded buildings on Rhodes island and evacuated 80 people to safer ground, with the city of Ialysos hit the hardest. No injuries were reported.

Cars and debris were piled up high in the flooded streets of Rhodes, with residents trying to remove mud from their water-logged properties.

“The situation is tragic, some have lost their homes, some have fled, our cars are in a terrible condition,” said Sofia Kanelli in Ialysos.

Fire brigade spokesperson Vassilis Varthakogiannis told Greece’s SKAI TV that the bad weather would continue Monday.

The Mediterranean country has been ravaged by floods and wildfires in recent years, with scientists saying that Greece has become a “hot spot” for climate change.

“The conditions in recent years are different; we have sudden rainfall and sudden floods,” Varthakogiannis said.

In 2023, more than 20,000 tourists and locals were forced to flee homes and seaside hotels as wildfires burned for days.

Thunderstorms and heavy rain also interrupted train services in mainland Greece, especially in the center and north of the country. 
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The United States is not considering returning to Ukraine the nuclear weapons it gave up after the Soviet Union collapsed, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday.

Sullivan made his remarks when questioned about a New York Times article last month that said some unidentified Western officials had suggested U.S. President Joe Biden could give Ukraine the arms before he leaves office.

“That is not under consideration, no. What we are doing is surging various conventional capacities to Ukraine so that they can effectively defend themselves and take the fight to the Russians, not [giving them] nuclear capability,” he told ABC.

Last week, Russia said the idea was “absolute insanity” and that preventing such a scenario was one of the reasons why Moscow sent troops into Ukraine.

Kyiv inherited nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union after its 1991 collapse but gave them up under a 1994 agreement, the Budapest Memorandum, in return for security assurances from Russia, the United States and Britain.
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KYIV, UKRAINE — Russian President Vladimir Putin approved budget plans, raising 2025 military spending to record levels as Moscow seeks to prevail in the war in Ukraine.

Around 32.5% of the budget posted on a government website Sunday has been allocated for national defense, amounting to 13.5 trillion rubles (more than $145 billion), up from a reported 28.3% this year.

Lawmakers in both houses of the Russian parliament, the State Duma and Federation Council had already approved the plans in the past 10 days.

Russia’s war on Ukraine, which started in February 2022, is Europe’s biggest conflict since World War II and has drained the resources of both sides.

Kyiv has been getting billions of dollars in help from its Western allies, but Russia’s forces are bigger and better equipped, and in recent months the Russian army has gradually been pushing Ukrainian troops backward in eastern areas.

On the ground in Ukraine, three people died in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson when a Russian drone struck a minibus on Sunday morning, Kherson regional Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said. Seven others were wounded in the attack.

Meanwhile, the number of wounded in Saturday’s missile strike in Dnipro in central Ukraine rose to 24, with seven in serious condition, Dnipropetrovsk regional Gov. Serhiy Lysak said. Four people were killed in the attack.

Moscow sent 78 drones into Ukraine overnight into Sunday, Ukrainian officials said. According to Ukraine’s air force, 32 drones were destroyed during the overnight attacks. A further 45 drones were “lost” over various areas, likely having been electronically jammed.

In Russia, a child was killed in a Ukrainian drone attack in the Bryansk region bordering Ukraine, according to regional Gov. Alexander Bogomaz.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said that 29 Ukrainian drones were shot down overnight into Sunday in four regions of western Russia: 20 over the Bryansk region, seven over the Kaluga region, and one each over the Smolensk and Kursk regions.
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KYIV, UKRAINE — The EU’s new top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, and head of the European Council, Antonio Costa, arrived in Kyiv on Sunday in a symbolic show of support for Ukraine on their first day in office.

“We came to give a clear message that we stand with Ukraine, and we continue to give our full support,” Costa told media outlets including AFP accompanying them on the trip.

The European Union’s new leadership team is keen to demonstrate it remains firm on backing Kyiv at a perilous moment for Ukraine nearly three years into its fight against Russia’s all-out invasion.

Questions are swirling around the future of U.S. support once Donald Trump assumes office in January and there are fears he could force Kyiv to make painful concessions in pursuit of a quick peace deal.

Meanwhile, tensions have escalated as Russian President Vladimir Putin has threatened to strike government buildings in Kyiv with his new Oreshnik missile after firing it at Ukraine for the first time last month.

The Kremlin leader said the move is a response to Kyiv getting the green light to strike inside Russia with American and British missiles, and he has threatened to hit back against the countries supplying the weaponry.

As winter begins, Russia has also unleashed devastating barrages against Ukraine’s power grid and on the frontline Kyiv’s fatigued forces are losing ground to Moscow’s grinding offensive.

“The situation in Ukraine is very, very grave,” Kallas, a former prime minister of Estonia, said. “But it’s clear that it comes at a very high cost for Russia as well.”

Ceasefire?

The new EU leaders — the bloc’s top officials along with European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen — were set to hold talks with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Zelenskyy on Friday appeared to begin staking out his position ahead of any potential peace talks.

He called on NATO to offer guaranteed protections to parts of Ukraine controlled by Kyiv in order to “stop the hot stage of the war,” and implied he would then be willing to wait to regain other territory seized by Russia.

“If we speak ceasefire, [we need] guarantees that Putin will not come back,” Zelenskyy told Britain’s Sky News.

Kallas said that “the strongest security guarantee is NATO membership.”

“We need to definitely discuss this — if Ukraine decides to draw the line somewhere then how can we secure peace so that Putin doesn’t go any further,” she said.

Diplomats at NATO say there appears little prospect of the alliance granting Ukraine membership soon given opposition from a raft of members cautious of getting dragged into war with Russia.

Kallas said the EU “shouldn’t really rule out anything” in terms of the question of sending European troops to help enforce any ceasefire.

“We should have this strategic ambiguity around this,” she said.

‘Transactional language’

Trump has cast doubt on continuing Washington’s vast aid for Ukraine and called on EU countries to do more.

Europe together has spent around $125 billion on supporting Ukraine since Russia’s 2022 invasion, while the United States alone has coughed up over $90 billion, according to a tracker from the Kiel Institute.

Kallas said the EU would use a “transactional language” to try to convince Trump that backing Kyiv was in the interest of the U.S.

“Aid for Ukraine is not charity,” she said. “A victory for Russia definitely emboldens China, Iran, North Korea.”

The new EU foreign policy chief said the bloc would continue seeking to put Ukraine in the “strongest” position — if and when Kyiv chose it was time to negotiate with Moscow.

But she conceded that it was becoming “increasingly difficult” for the 27-nation bloc to agree on new ways to ramp up support for Ukraine.

“This war has been going on for quite some time and it is harder and harder to explain it to our own people,” she said. “But I don’t see any option.”
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BUCHAREST, ROMANIA — Still reeling from this week’s shock developments, Romanians returned to the polls Sunday to elect their Parliament, with the far right tipped to win, potentially heralding a shift in the NATO country’s foreign policy.

Romania was thrown into turmoil after a top court ordered a recount of the first round of last week’s presidential election won by Calin Georgescu, a little-known far-right admirer of Russian President Vladimir Putin. A runoff in that poll is slated for December 8.

Despite accusations of Russian influence and alleged interference via TikTok, Sunday’s parliamentary elections went ahead as planned.

While the recounting of more than 9 million ballots appeared to proceed quickly, people on the streets of Bucharest expressed worries about the recent twists and turns.

“What’s going on now doesn’t seem very democratic,” Gina Visan told AFP at a Christmas market in Bucharest.

“They should respect our vote. We’re disappointed, but we’re used to this kind of behavior,” said the 40-year-old nurse, echoing voter’s distrust in traditional parties.

Polling stations opened at 7 a.m. (0500 GMT) and will close at 9 p.m., with an exit poll due to be published shortly afterward.

The first official results are expected later in the evening.

Confusion, anger and fear

Amid allegations of irregularities and possible interference in the election, concerns over the transparency of the electoral process have emerged, with independent observers being denied access to the recount.

According to Septimius Parvu of the Expert Forum think tank, the recount order by Romania’s Constitutional Court had “many negative effects,” including undermining confidence in institutions.

“We’ve already recounted votes in Romania in the past, but not millions of votes, with parliamentary elections in the middle of it all,” said Parvu.

“No decision made during this crucial period should limit the right of Romanians to vote freely nor further put at risk the credibility of the election process,” the U.S. Embassy in Romania stressed.

But the top court’s decision is likely to boost the far right, Parvu said.

The NATO member of 19 million people has so far resisted rising nationalism in the region, but experts say it faces an unprecedented situation as anger over soaring inflation and fears of being dragged into Russia’s war in neighboring Ukraine have mounted.

George Sorin in Bucharest said he hopes the far right will score well, claiming the current Parliament had mostly served the interests of “Brussels and Ukraine” instead of “national interests.”

Outgoing President Klaus Iohannis said Sunday’s vote would determine Romania’s future — whether it will “remain a country of freedom and openness or collapse into toxic isolation and a dark past.”

Far right eyes breakthrough

Romania’s political landscape has been shaped by two major parties for the past three decades, but analysts predict a fragmented Parliament to emerge from Sunday’s vote, influencing the chances of forming a future government.

Polls show that three far-right parties are predicted to claim more than 30% of the vote share combined.

Among them is the AUR party, whose leader George Simion won nearly 14% of the presidential vote, which topped the latest polls on more than 22%.

“We are here, standing, alive, more numerous than ever, and with a huge opportunity ahead of us,” Simion — a fan of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump — recently told his supporters.

The Party of Young People (POT), which was founded in 2023 and has meanwhile thrown its support behind Georgescu, could reach the 5% threshold to enter Parliament and there is also the extreme-right SOS Romania party, led by firebrand Diana Sosoaca.

In recent years, around 30% of Romanians have embraced far-right views, even if they have not always voted for them in elections.

Elena Lasconi’s pro-European USR party has warned that the country faces “a historic confrontation” between those who wish to “preserve Romania’s young democracy” and those who want to “return to the Russian sphere of influence.”

The ruling Social Democrats (PSD) and the National Liberal Party (PNL), which suffered a defeat in the presidential ballot, have centered their campaigns on their “experience.”

“The political scene is completely reset,” said political scientist Remus Stefureac, adding that 2025 “will be extremely complicated in terms of security risks.”
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BUSAN, SOUTH KOREA — Dozens of countries warned Sunday that a handful of nations were obstructing efforts in South Korea to reach an ambitious landmark global treaty to curb plastic pollution.

With hours until negotiations are scheduled to end, delegates say a group of mostly oil-producing “like-minded countries” have refused to compromise on key sticking points.

Those include setting targets for reducing plastic production and phasing out chemicals known or believed to be harmful to human health.

“We also are worried by the continuing obstruction by the so-called like-minded countries,” Olga Givernet, France’s minister delegate for energy, told reporters.

Finding an agreement on an ambitious treaty “remains an absolute priority,” Givernet said, and “we are planning on pushing it.”

Plastic production is on track to triple by 2060, and over 90% of plastic is not recycled.

But while everyone negotiating in Busan agrees on the problem, they disagree on the solution.

Countries including Saudi Arabia and Russia insist the deal should focus only on waste and reject calls for binding global measures.

They have made their position clear in documents submitted in negotiations and during public plenary sessions, though neither delegation responded to repeated AFP requests for comment.

‘Blocking the process’

“It is disappointing to see that a small number of members remain unsupportive of the measures necessary to drive real change,” said Rwanda’s Juliet Kabera.

“We still have a few hours left in these negotiations, there is time to find common ground, but Rwanda cannot accept a toothless treaty,” she warned.

Fiji’s Sivendra Michael also called out a “very minority group” for “blocking the process.”

The latest draft text for the treaty contains a range of options, reflecting the ongoing divisions. A promised new version has been repeatedly delayed.

The talks are supposed to be the final round of negotiations after two years of discussion.

The venue has only been rented until mid-morning Monday, sources told AFP.

Portuguese delegate Maria Joao Teixeira said there were real fears talks could collapse and have to be extended to another round elsewhere.

“We are really trying to not have a weak treaty,” she told AFP.

Environmental groups have pushed ambitious countries to call a vote if progress stalls.

But observers caution that risks alienating even some countries in favor of a strong treaty.

Another option would be for the diplomat chairing the talks to simply gavel through an agreement over the objections of a handful of holdouts, they said.

That too holds risks, potentially embittering the remaining diplomatic process and jeopardizing adoption of a treaty down the road.

‘Hope in consensus’

Mexico’s head of delegation Camila Zepeda said she did not favor calling a vote.

“We have hope in consensus. The multilateral process is slow, but there is a possibility of having critical mass to move forward,” she told AFP.

“Showing this critical mass helps us so that the more contentious issues can be unblocked.”

German delegate Sebastian Unger also said many countries would prefer to avoid a vote.

“If you would leave out many important countries that you want to have on board, then the effects of the treaty [are impacted],” he told AFP.

Over 100 countries now support setting a target for production cuts, and dozens also back phasing out some chemicals and unnecessary plastic products.

But representatives of China and the United States, the world’s two top plastics producers, were absent from the stage at a news conference urging ambition.

“They are still considering, and we are hopeful that there will be some interest on their part,” said Mexico’s Zepeda.

“This coalition of the willing is an open invitation. And so it’s not like it’s them against us.”

Panama’s Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez meanwhile told colleagues that “history will not forgive us” for leaving Busan without an ambitious treaty.

“This is the time to step up or get out.”
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WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA — President-elect Donald Trump threatened 100% tariffs Saturday against a bloc of nine nations if they act to undermine the U.S. dollar. 

His threat was directed at countries in the so-called BRICS alliance, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. 

Turkey, Azerbaijan and Malaysia have applied to become members of the alliance, and several other countries have expressed interest in joining. 

While the U.S. dollar is by far the most-used currency in global business and has survived past challenges to its preeminence, members of the alliance and other developing nations say they are fed up with America’s dominance of the global financial system. 

Trump, in a Truth Social post, said, “We require a commitment from these Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs, and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful U.S. Economy.” 

At a summit of BRICS nations in October, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of “weaponizing” the dollar and described it as a “big mistake.” 

“It’s not us who refuse to use the dollar,” Putin said at the time. “But if they don’t let us work, what can we do? We are forced to search for alternatives.” 

Russia has specifically pushed for the creation of a new payment system that would offer an alternative to the global bank messaging network, SWIFT, and allow Moscow to dodge Western sanctions and trade with partners. 

Trump said there is “no chance” BRICS will replace the U.S. dollar in global trade and any country that tries to make that happen “should wave goodbye to America.” 
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