Romania: Party colleagues want leader out over graft trial

Three senior members of Romania’s ruling Social Democratic Party have urged the party’s powerful chairman to resign, saying he’s a liability due to a conviction for abuse of power.

Signatories of Wednesday’s nine-point letter, including Bucharest mayor Gabriela Firea, claimed that under Liviu Dragnea, the party’s reputation and popularity had suffered over a contentious judicial overhaul, criticized by the European Union and the U.S.

Thousands of Romanians have regularly protested the overhaul they say will make it harder to prosecute high-level corruption.

In June, Dragnea was handed a 3½-year sentence for abuse of power in office. He has appealed. The signatories called the conviction “a perpetual source of mistrust at home and abroad.”

Criticism has mounted against Dragnea since an anti-corruption protest last month left hundreds injured.

Dragnea has repeatedly refused to resign.