In the first round of Romania's presidential election, a far-right candidate who opposes NATO has taken an unexpected lead.
Calin Georgescu, an independent, won 22.94% of votes in Sunday's voting, knocking Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu out of the race.
Georgescu will face center-right contender Elena Lasconi, leader of the opposition Save Romania Union, in the presidential run-off on December 8.
The outcome was a shock as pre-election opinion polls had Ciolacu as the frontrunner.
He resigned as leader of his Social Democratic Party (PSD) on Monday but said he would stay prime minister until a parliamentary election in December.
Georgescu, formerly a prominent member of the far-right Alliance for Uniting Romanians party, was only polling at around 5% in the build-up to the election.
He has claimed that NATO would not protect any of its members should they be attacked by Russia and called the alliance's ballistic missile defense shield in the Romanian town of Deveselu a "shame of diplomacy."
He also said Romania's best chance lay with "Russian wisdom," but has refused to say explicitly whether he supports Russia.
His jump from single-figure ratings to Sunday's first-round election lead is without precedent since the collapse of communism in Romania in 1989.
Georgescu denied charges of being an extremist as "false, totally fake" and said he is "completely dedicated" to the Romanian people. "We remain directly linked to European values, but we must find our (own) values," he said
"We are strong and brave, many of us voted, even more will do so in the second round," Georgescu said on Sunday evening.
