Romanian presidential candidate Calin Georgescu said his recent claims about the partition of Ukraine's territories were "an absolutely theoretical hypothesis," Digi24 reported on Feb. 3.
Romanian far-right populist Georgescu tried to somewhat walk back on his remarks, days after he called Ukraine a "fictional state" and claimed that Ukraine's borders can change as a result of Russia's full-scale war, suggesting Romania could claim some of the country's territories.
Speaking on Romanian television on Feb. 2, Georgescu said that politicians who criticize him for these words are "short-sighted."
"I was talking about a very simple thing, by the way. We have to learn from our historical experience. The world is changing," Georgescu said.
"If we talk about the period of World War II, we made a lot of mistakes, we did not really understand how to position ourselves. And Greater Romania became Little Romania. This is the reality," he added.
Georgescu's recent comments were also dismissed by Kyiv as revisionist and contrary to international norms, the U.N. Charter, and democratic values.
"His attempts to position himself as an 'independent' politician look absurd — the rhetoric he voiced is identical to Russian propaganda, indicating complete dependence on his masters in Moscow," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said.
Earlier, similar remarks were made by other Romanian far-right politicians. Claudiu Tarziu, one of the leaders of Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) party, said his country should "reunite" with Moldova and the Ukrainian border regions of Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina, and Zakarpattia.
Zakarpattia Oblast is Ukraine's westernmost region with significant Hungarian and Romanian ethnic minorities. The historical region of Northern Bukovina is a part of today's Ukrainian Chernivtsi Oblast, while Bessarabia covers Moldova and parts of Chernivtsi and Odesa oblasts.
Kateryna Hodunova
(Updated: )
