Romania’s parliament voted Friday to impeach President Traian Băsescu in a spiralling political crisis that has raised warnings in the West that the country’s democracy is under threat.

A total of 258 lawmakers out of 432 voted in favour of the move against the centre-right Băsescu, said Dan Radu Rusanu, a senator with the governing coalition, but the impeachment will only take effect if approved in a referendum within 30 days.

Two decades after Romania emerged from communist dictatorship, it has been thrown into turmoil by a bitter feud between Băsescu and his arch-rival, the centre-left Prime Minister Victor Ponta.

h/t: The Raw Story