Leader of Romania's third biggest parliamentary party Dan Barna stays despite election defeat

Dan Barna, the leader of Save Romania Union (USR), the third biggest party in the Parliament, was re-elected as head of the political group despite a serious defeat in the first round of presidential elections.

USR has built a reputation of a party targeting people discontent with traditional political groups. It scored good results in European elections earlier this year and hoped its leader, Dan Barna, would manage to outrun ex-PM and Social Democratic leader Viorica Dancila and advance to the second round of presidential elections this fall.

But Barna suffered a serious defeat and Dancila is now challenging favorite candidate Klaus Iohannis, the incumbent president, in the second round of elections this weekend.

Still, Barna refused to resign despite calls to do so. And on Wednesday he announced he would stay leader of USR as 70% of party members voted so in an online, internal poll.