Bucharest’s Mayor Traian Basescu gestures in reaction to the first official exit poll results for Romanian presidential elections at the Democratic Party headquarters in Bucharest late on Sunday. After clinching victory yesterday, he said he would make the fight against corruption and Romania’s bid to join the EU his priorities.

By Alexandru Alexe - The Associated Press

BUCHAREST - Bucharest Mayor Traian Basescu yesterday claimed victory in Romania's presidential runoff, pledging to fight corruption and prepare Romania to join the European Union by 2007.

Basescu also vowed to fight poverty and restore press freedoms in a victory speech at his party's headquarters after his opponent, Prime Minister Adrian Nastase, conceded defeat.

«The top priority is to fight corruption,» Basescu said, adding that he would free state institutions from political interference and «put them to work on behalf of the citizens.»

«It is the decision of the Romanian people and I respect it,» Nastase said. «I congratulate Basescu,» he added, also saying that he had congratulated him personally on the telephone. «Basescu is the future president of Romania.»

Basescu, 53, said that he would consolidate ties with the United States and Britain to guarantee Romania's security, and that he would also seek good ties with Ukraine, Russia and other former Soviet states.

He said his Justice and Truth Alliance would try to form a parliamentary majority by gaining the support of a party representing ethnic Hungarians and the small Humanist Party, which was previously allied to Nastase, but issued a statement yesterday expressing its independence.

Basescu's victory dealt a major blow to the successors of Romania's communists, who have governed for most of the period since the 1989 revolution.

With all the ballots counted, Basescu had 51.23 percent of the vote, compared with Nastase's 48.77.

President Ion Iliescu, who had supported Nastase, called Basescu yesterday to congratulate him, the president's spokeswoman, Corina Cretu, said. Iliescu said the runoff elections were fair and that they confirmed Romania has a working democracy, she added.

Early results from Sunday's election sent thousands of Basescu supporters onto the streets in cities around Romania.

The opposition is seen by many Romanians as less connected to the communists who ruled until a violent 1989 revolution, and less tainted by corruption and political foul play.

However, Nastase's Social Democratic Party has overseen a period of economic growth - and the opposition, during four years in power until 2000, proved unable to reform a system riddled with corruption.

In the parliamentary elections, Nastase's party won 189 of 469 seats, while Basescu's Alliance won 161. Neither has enough seats to form a majority.

In an interview with the Romanian service of the British Broadcasting Corp., Basescu said he would not form a government with the nationalist Greater Romania Party.

Diplomats say US and European officials have explicitly warned candidates not to ally themselves with nationalist party leader Corneliu Vadim Tudor. Tudor's party is best known for baiting Jews, Hungarians, Gypsies and other minorities.

By law, the president names a prime minister, who then needs to be approved by a vote in Parliament. The president can dissolve Parliament if it fails to approve a government within 60 days.

Basescu had campaigned for economic reform, promising to lower taxes and fight corruption. He is also seen as a social reformer and has said he supports greater rights for gays - a stance that drew heavy criticism from the Orthodox Christian Church.