Nationalist politician Calin Georgescu, considered the frontrunner in Romania's presidential race, has promised to end all military aid for Ukraine and put his people first.
The candidate clinched a surprise win in the first round of the Romanian election in November with 22.94% of the ballots, beating out liberal leftist candidate Elena Lasconi, who received 19.18%. The two will compete in a runoff on Sunday.
Georgescu, a religious nationalist, campaigned as an independent candidate on curtailing Romania’s reliance on imports, boosting domestic production and criticizing Bucharest’s role in the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
He promised to end all military and political assistance to Kiev if elected in the runoff, speaking to the BBC on Thursday.
“I have to take care of my people. I don’t want to involve my people,” Georgescu said when asked if he would support Ukraine as long as it takes for it to win.
“Zero. Everything stops. I have to take care just about my people. We have a lot of problems ourselves.”
The BBC said Georgescu, who is a former soil scientist, praised Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and US President-elect Donald Trump, who was reelected last month and has made similar promises to cut back spending on Ukraine and focus on domestic problems. While Georgescu praised Russian President Vladimir Putin as a “patriot and a leader,” the Romanian frontrunner remarked that he is “not a fan.”
Georgescu dismissed recent allegations of foreign collusion in his campaign, saying that his detractors “can't accept that the Romanian people finally said, 'we want our life back’.”
The accusations state that the independent politician’s popularity was helped by a “state actor” meddling in his mostly Tik-Tok based campaign, helping to get his message out to the voters.
Tik-Tok has said claims that Georgescu’s social media account was given preferential treatment are “categorically false.”
The Kremlin has denied Romanian accusations of Russian interference, slamming them as part of a “basic trend” in the West.
Should the candidate win on Sunday, it would herald a notable change in Bucharest’s position on supporting Kiev. Romania has provided Ukraine with more than €1.1 billion ($1.18 billion) in mostly military aid, including a costly US-produced Patriot air defense system, according to Germany’s Kiel Institute.