Polish President Andrzej Duda received George Simion, the far-right frontrunner of the Romanian elections, in Warsaw on Wednesday.
The meeting came ahead of the upcoming presidential elections on Sunday in both nations, where Romania is set to host the run-off after Simion won the first round with 41% of the votes.
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Duda’s office announced the meeting on X and said the two discussed “bilateral relations between Poland and Romania.”
“President @AndrzejDuda received the Vice-Chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group at the Presidential Palace @georgesimion. The main topic of the conversation was bilateral relations between Poland and Romania,” the update reads.
“The meeting was attended by the Head of the Chancellery of the President of the Republic of Poland Małgorzata Paprocka, the Head of BPM @wkolarski and Head of the EKR Group @MorawieckiM,” it adds.
Simion, in response, called his meeting with Duda “excellent” in his X update.
A day prior, Simion appeared alongside Polish conservative candidate Karol Nawrocki, who is backed by Duda’s Law and Justice (PiS) party, at a rally and endorsed him.
“George Simion declares that as President of Romania he will support Karol Nawrocki in the campaign every day,” reads an X update shared by Simion’s profile.
The PiS and Simion’s Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) party both belong to the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group in the European Parliament.
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Politico’s polls as of Monday, May 12, show that Nawrocki trails behind pro-EU candidate Rafał Trzaskowski in the upcoming Polish elections, while Simion is leading the polls against pro-EU candidate Nicușor Dan by 3% in the Romanian run-off.
Who is George Simion?
Simion is a Romanian nationalist politician and co-founder of the AUR party.
Simion is an ally of far-right outsider Calin Georgescu, who won the initial elections in late 2024 that were subsequently annulled due to irregularities. Georgescu was later barred from rerunning due to what Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau (BEC) called anti-democratic and extremist views.
A former Moldovan official has accused Simion of working with Russian intelligence in a 2023 interview. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has also reportedly banned Simion from entering the country due to “systematic anti-Ukrainian activities,” as reported by Euractiv.
However, Simion described Russia as a “threat” in a recent interview with the Financial Times.
Simion has opposed military aid for Ukraine in late 2024 but said it does not mean he is pro-Russian, according to a Voice of America report at the time.
Who’s Karol Nawrocki?
Nawrocki is a Polish historian and conservative political figure currently serving as the president of the Institute of National Remembrance.
Backed by Duda’s PiS party, Nawrocki shared similar views on Ukraine and the EU as Duda, namely supportive of Ukraine in certain respects and critical of the EU.
In January, Nawrocki said he would continue to support Ukraine if elected but called for “reciprocity” from Kyiv.
A month later, he questioned Kyiv’s NATO and EU bid, doubting that NATO should admit Ukraine in the near future and saying EU admission “should not be unconditional,” according to Euractiv.
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