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Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Romania’s invalidated election, a massive European Union-Mercosur free trade deal, and demands to suspend South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol’s powers.
‘Aggressive’ Russian Attacks
Romania’s Constitutional Court annulled the country’s ongoing presidential election on Friday, citing alleged Russian interference. The top court’s decision is final and binding. Under the ruling, the entire presidential election process—during which more than half of registered voters had submitted their ballots during the first round—will have to be rerun. Outgoing President Klaus Iohannis’s term ends on Dec. 21, and until the government selects a new election date, it is unclear who will be the head of state after he leaves.
Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Romania’s invalidated election, a massive European Union-Mercosur free trade deal, and demands to suspend South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol’s powers.
‘Aggressive’ Russian Attacks
Romania’s Constitutional Court annulled the country’s ongoing presidential election on Friday, citing alleged Russian interference. The top court’s decision is final and binding. Under the ruling, the entire presidential election process—during which more than half of registered voters had submitted their ballots during the first round—will have to be rerun. Outgoing President Klaus Iohannis’s term ends on Dec. 21, and until the government selects a new election date, it is unclear who will be the head of state after he leaves.
The runoff, initially scheduled for this Sunday, pitted pro-Russian, far-right candidate Calin Georgescu against pro-European Union, centrist leader Elena Lasconi. On Monday, the Constitutional Court validated the first presidential election round, which saw Georgescu surge to first place despite opinion polling having him at single digits until just days before the election. However, the court decided to reverse that ruling after Romania’s top security council declassified documents on Wednesday that highlighted “aggressive hybrid Russian attacks” during the election period.
Moscow has denied any interference.
The court is “seeking to ensure the fairness and legality of the electoral process,” the justices said, adding that a detailed explanation of their ruling would be released at a later date. According to Romanian intelligence, authorities identified more than 85,000 attempted cyberattacks on election websites and IT systems.
They also accused Russia of running a vast influence campaign to promote Georgescu on social media platforms, including TikTok and Telegram, and they alleged that TikTok gave him “preferential treatment” by not marking him as a political candidate, in violation of the country’s electoral laws. TikTok has denied giving Georgescu any special treatment.
Romania’s anti-organized crime prosecuting unit announced on Friday that it will launch an investigation into Georgescu’s campaign. It is unclear if the pro-Russian candidate will be allowed to participate in the rerun.
Social Democrat Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu—who ran in the election but did not make the runoff—called the ruling “the only correct solution.” However, many lawmakers have denounced the court’s decision. This “is practically an official coup d’etat,” Georgescu said on Friday in a recorded message. “The state is in an induced coma.”
Lasconi also condemned the ruling. “The constitutional court’s decision is illegal, amoral, and crushes the very essence of democracy,” she said. “Whether we like it or not, from a legal and legitimate standpoint, 9 million Romanian citizens, both in the country and the diaspora, expressed their preference for a particular candidate through their votes.”
Analysts worry that the court’s decision could erode Romania’s institutions, trigger protests, and potentially endanger the country’s pro-Western trajectory; Romania is a member of the EU and NATO. Georgescu seeks to shift closer to other Moscow-friendly nations in Eastern Europe and end Bucharest’s support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.
Such a shift away from the West “would have serious negative impacts on U.S. security cooperation with Romania,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller warned on Wednesday, following the documents’ declassification.
The parliamentary elections held on Dec. 1, in which far-right parties secured a third of seats but the ruling Social Democrats won the largest grouping, will be unaffected by the court’s ruling.
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What We’re Following
Blockbuster trade agreement. After 25 years of talks, the European Union and Mercosur blocs finally clinched a massive free trade deal at a summit in Uruguay on Friday. The agreement will drop tariffs on more than 90 percent of goods, creating a new market of 700 million people. Negotiators hope that it will help reduce Europe’s reliance on China and insulate the continent from proposed tariffs that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has threatened.
“This agreement is not just an economic opportunity; it is a political necessity,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said. “I know that strong winds are coming in the opposite direction, toward isolation and fragmentation, but this agreement is our near response.”
The deal still faces several significant challenges. Before it can go into effect, the text must be translated into all EU languages, which could take several months as lawyers pore over the wording. The European Commission must then seek approval from all EU members, in which at least four nations representing at least 35 percent of the bloc’s population must adopt it, and then the European Parliament must vote to pass it.
Such approval may be tricky, as farmers across Europe have already vowed to oppose the deal. They claim that farmers in Mercosur’s four founding countries (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay) damage the environment with their lower statements for pesticide use and animal treatment. Heads of government in Austria, France, the Netherlands, and Poland have also expressed concerns that the free trade deal could subject European markets to unfair competition.
Suspending powers. South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol suffered another political blow on Friday when the leader of his People Power Party, Han Dong-hoon, called for the suspension of his executive powers. Han cited “credible evidence” that Yoon sought to arrest his opponents after declaring a short-lived martial law order on Tuesday.
According to Hong Jang-won, the deputy director of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, Yoon had demanded the arrest of Han, Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, and several other legislators. Han had previously vowed to try to stop impeachment proceedings against Yoon, which the president is expected to face on Saturday. However, Han said that learning of this intelligence has changed his mind, adding that he believes there is a “significant risk” that Yoon could take similar action again if he were to remain in power.
Synagogue fire. Australian authorities are searching for several people who allegedly set fire to a synagogue in Melbourne early Friday. Emergency services were called to Adass Israel synagogue around 4 a.m. local time—just an hour before the temple was scheduled to hold morning services. One person sustained minor injuries, local police said, and the building reportedly suffered significant damage.
“I have zero tolerance for antisemitism,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said. “It has absolutely no place in Australia.” Reports of antisemitic acts in Australia and around the world have increased since Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel. According to the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, more than 2,000 anti-Jewish incidents were documented in the country between October 2023 and this September.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Albanese’s government of encouraging such crimes with so-called anti-Israel policies, including supporting the creation of a Palestinian state.
Odds and Ends
When a massive fire destroyed much of Paris’s iconic Notre Dame Cathedral in April 2019, thousands of people around the world mourned. This weekend, though, France will reopen the historic UNESCO World Heritage Site after an extensive restoration process. The two-day ceremony, which will be attended by around 50 world leaders, comes at a time when French President Emmanuel Macron is struggling to establish an air of stability following a no-confidence vote that ousted Prime Minister Michel Barnier on Wednesday.