{"id":72123,"date":"2025-05-03T21:08:17","date_gmt":"2025-05-03T21:08:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/72123\/"},"modified":"2025-05-03T21:08:17","modified_gmt":"2025-05-03T21:08:17","slug":"calin-georgescu-ban-exposes-eu-hypocrisy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/72123\/","title":{"rendered":"C\u0103lin Georgescu ban exposes EU hypocrisy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As Romanians prepare to head to the polls on May 4 and 18, they do so under the shadow of a deep betrayal of democracy. <strong>C\u0103lin Georgescu<\/strong>, the candidate who won the first round of last year\u2019s <strong>presidential elections<\/strong>, has been banned from running, under the flimsy and increasingly weaponised accusation of \u201cRussian interference\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Whatever one may think of <strong>Georgescu\u2019s<\/strong> political positions, banning a candidate after an electoral victory strikes at the heart of democracy itself. It is the textbook definition of lawfare \u2013 using judicial and administrative measures to sideline political opponents that the establishment fears they cannot defeat at the ballot box.<\/p>\n<p>The <strong>European Union<\/strong> and its mouthpieces frequently lecture others about \u201cdemocratic values\u201d and \u201cthe rule of law\u201d. Yet, when a candidate emerges who dares to challenge <strong>NATO\u2019s war agenda<\/strong> or questions the EU\u2019s political orthodoxy, those very principles are thrown out the window.<\/p>\n<p>Georgescu\u2019s vocal opposition to the continuation of the Ukraine war \u2013 and by extension, to NATO\u2019s aggressive expansion \u2013 clearly made him a threat, especially as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/c977wggg4pgo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">NATO builds its largest military base in Europe on Romanian soil<\/a>. His silencing is no coincidence; it is a political manoeuvre.<\/p>\n<p>As continues to be proven, such acts of repression do not eliminate dissent \u2013 they radicalise it. By banning candidates like Georgescu, the establishment is only turbocharging the growth of far-right and anti-democratic forces. When citizens see their votes disregarded and the political process rigged, they will inevitably turn to those who promise to tear the system down \u2013 often with far more dangerous agendas.<\/p>\n<p>The Romanian case is not isolated. Across Europe, we are witnessing a pattern, like with the recent conviction of <strong>Marine Le Pen<\/strong>, in a textbook case of \u2018<a href=\"https:\/\/diem25.org\/le-pen-and-the-lawfare-debate-justice-or-political-weapon-with-yanis-varoufakis-glenn-greenwald-and-david-broder\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">lawfare<\/a>\u2018: when establishment-backed candidates falter, institutions are bent, laws are twisted, and elections are manipulated to preserve a decaying order.<\/p>\n<p>If the EU wants to speak credibly about democracy, it must first confront the anti-democratic rot within its own ranks \u2013 starting with Romania\u2019s grotesque exclusion of Georgescu from the upcoming election.<\/p>\n<p>Democracy cannot be selectively applied. It must be defended for all, or it collapses for everyone.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top:40px;\">Do you want to be informed of DiEM25&#8217;s actions? <a href=\"https:\/\/internal.diem25.org\/en\/newsletter\/?refer=article54234\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sign up here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As Romanians prepare to head to the polls on May 4 and 18, they do so under the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72124,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2000,299,5187,35976,1438],"class_list":{"0":"post-72123","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-european","11":"tag-lawfare","12":"tag-romania"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114445949643680431","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72123\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}