France, May 15 -- Twenty percent of Romanians live outside the country - a total of 5 million people - and in the first round of the presidential election that concludes on Sunday, they voted overwhelmingly for far-right candidateGeorge Simion, despite his Eurosceptic stance.

In the first round of the election on 4 May, the Romanian far right obtained even higher results outside its borders than it did within - Simion came first with more than 40 per cent of the vote in Romania, but took more than 60 per cent of the vote in the diaspora.

This was a repeat of the pattern seenduring the cancelled presidential elections in Romania in 2024, the results of which were annulled by Romania's highest court, citing allegations of Russian interfer...