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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
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Andrei Popoviciu

In Romania, the far right has unleashed a tide of hate and resurrected our fascist ghosts

Cǎlin Georgescu and wife Cristela arrive at the Central Electoral Bureau where Georgescu submitted his candidacy for the May presidential ballot rerun,  Bucharest, Romania, 7 March 2025.
Cǎlin Georgescu and wife Cristela arrive at the Central Electoral Bureau where Georgescu submitted his candidacy for the May presidential ballot rerun, Bucharest, Romania, 7 March 2025. Photograph: Inquam Photos/Octav Ganea/Reuters

In a forest outside Bucharest, a woman cradled her infant in one arm while raising the other in a Nazi salute. She was one of about 70 people who gathered on 30 November last year to commemorate the anniversary of the death of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, a leader of Romania’s interwar fascist Legionary Movement and head of its paramilitary wing, the Iron Guard.

Codreanu and his ally, Ion Antonescu – Romania’s virulently antisemitic wartime dictator – were central figures in the country’s Holocaust history. Codreanu was assassinated in 1938 and Antonescu was executed as a war criminal in 1946.

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