BUCHAREST, Dec. 14 (Xinhua) -- Romania's Social Democrats leader Mircea Geoana said on Monday evening that he accepts the Constitutional Court ruling which confirmed the re-election of incumbent President Traian Basescu.

    Geoana made the statement soon after the court validated the Dec. 6 presidential elections, rejecting the appeal by the main opposition Social Democratic Party for an annulment of the "fraudulent" second round of the presidential run-off.

    "Unfortunately, the evidence of massive frauds and investigation requests were not accepted," Geoana said, stressing that "fraud suspicions connected to these elections will haunt Romania and our democracy in the years to come."

    "I wish Traian Basescu good luck in his new term," the social democrat leader said, adding that he had conveyed his message to the incumbent president, with whom he talked over phone prior to his statement to the press.

    Geoana also expressed his hope that Basescu's new term will bring "more balance" and "less excess."

    The Social Democrats submitted last Tuesday an appeal to the Constitutional Court for annulment of the second round of the presidential run-off won by incumbent President Basescu, citing claims of vote fraud. But the high court only ordered recounting of the voided votes, without ruling on another complaint filed by the Social Democrats to repudiate the results as a whole due to what the party called massive fraud.

    The recounting identified 2,247 validly expressed ballots out of the total of 136,067 null ballots, but did not reverse the original outcome.

    "The battle for Romania's presidency ends here," but "the battle for the truth continues," stressed Geoana in the statement.

    The Social Democratic leader announced earlier Monday that the Social Democratic Party decided to ask the Parliament's joint Standing Bureaus to set up an exceptional parliamentary commission to investigate whether the election was marred by fraud.

    Romanians cast their ballots on Dec. 6 in the presidential run-off, in the hope of an end to their country's political plight that has blocked external assistance in a time of worldwide recession.

    Romania has been in the hands of a caretaker government since mid-October, when its democrat liberal government was ousted in a non-confidence vote in parliament and Basescu failed to push through parliament his nominations for a new prime minister.

    The Dec. 6 presidential run-off has been widely seen as crucial for Romania. The winner will have to move quickly to name a new prime minister and solve a political crisis that has made international donors postpone a massive aid package to the country-- the third installment of a 20-billion-euro (29.65 billion U.S. dollars) bailout package led by the International Monetary Fund.