(Adnkronos) – The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), based in Strasbourg, has unanimously declared inadmissible the appeal filed by the nationalist candidate for the presidency of Romania, Calin Georgescu, against the annulment of the entire electoral process decided by the Supreme Court in December – a few days before the ballot – due to alleged external interference. The decision, taken by three judges, is final, as reported by the Romanian press.
Georgescu, who surprisingly emerged as the winner of the first round and therefore admitted to the ballot, brought his case to the ECHR, arguing that the annulment would have violated his right to free elections under Article 3 of Additional Protocol No. 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights. He also claimed that the decision taken was illegitimate, disproportionate and politically motivated and denounced violations of his rights under Article 6 (right to a fair trial), Article 10 (freedom of expression) and Article 11 (freedom of assembly and association) of the Protocol. The ECHR rejected all the observations submitted by the presidential candidate, specifically motivating each of its decisions and in some cases defining Georgescu’s requests as “manifestly ill-founded”.
On 26 February, the latter was stopped by the police at the request of the Bucharest prosecutor’s office, which accused him of making false statements about the sources of funding for his election campaign. The elections in Romania will have to be repeated on 4 May next and Georgescu intends to stand again as an independent candidate. The Constitutional Court will have to decide by 15 March on the authorisation of his candidacy.
