Romania Court Jails Ruling Party Chief Dragnea

The Romanian Supreme Court on Monday sentenced Social Democratic Party leader Liviu Dragnea  - also president of the Chamber of Deputies - to three-and-a-half years in jail for illegal employment in Teleorman District, back when he chaired the county council in 2013.

The decision is final and was backed by four of the five judges on the panel. The judges also upheld his first-instance conviction.

It comes after his party came second in the European Parliament elections on Sunday, triggering protests and conflict inside the party.

In 2013, Dragnea was accused of making an illegal intervention to maintain and pay the salaries of two employees of the General Directorates for Social Assistance and Child Protection in Teleorman, although he knew they worked for the PSD's Teleorman organisation.

Following the sentence, the Supreme Court will issue a mandate to execute the sentence, which will be sent to the police.

Dragnea is expected to surrender alone to justice, or face being arrested at his home where he awaited the sentence.

Asked on Sunday night if he feared the court decision, the PSD leader replied: "I do not fear anything, if I was to be afraid, I would have been a snowdrop. It's not about fear, but if the court resists unimaginable pressures, they will release me because I'm completely innocent, but if they will not resist [the alleged pressures] they will sentence me."

This is Dragnea's second final conviction. He received a suspended conviction in April 2016 for abusing power in a referendum held in 2012 on the dismissal of the then president Traian Basescu.