Super Sunday Europe's course to be adjusted after millions go to polls

Millions of voters in Romania, Poland and Portugal will cast their ballots this weekend in an electoral "super Sunday" that will determine the course of their democracies at a time of heightened political, commercial and economic tensions.

- Sam Jones Madrid Jon Henley Bucharest Jakub Krupa Warsaw

In Romania, the far-right candidate is the frontrunner in a presidential run-off, while the first-round vote in a deeply polarised Poland will see liberal, conservative and far-right hopefuls vying to become president.

But in Portugal, which is holding a snap legislative election just 14 months after the last vote, the status quo looks set to continue.

Here's what you need to know.

Hasn't Romania already had a presidential election?

Yes. Well, the original vote last year was annulled - and its shock far-right winner disbarred - amid widespread concerns over Russian interference and other irregularities.

The vote on Sunday is the second round of the second presidential election in six months.

This time an ultranationalist, EU-critical Donald Trump admirer is in a run-off against a centrist independent in a vote that analysts have called the most important in Romania's post-communist history.

George Simion, 38, who sports Maga caps, promotes a socially conservative agenda and wants the "Melonisation" of Europe and to halt military aid to Ukraine, won the first round with 41% of the vote, nearly double the score of his rival.

Second-placed Nicuşor Dan, 55, the mayor of Bucharest, has cast the run-off as a fight between "a pro-western and an anti-western direction for Romania".

Polls show the gap between the two narrowing, with one putting them neck and neck.