Lithuania 'comes of age' in EU

2003-05-12 13:27

Vilnius - Lithuanians voted a resounding "Yes" to joining the European Union in a weekend referendum, opting to join the Western bloc just 13 years after breaking away from the Soviet Union.

Final results issued on Monday after votes at all of the 2 040 voting stations were counted showed that 89.92% of voters said "Yes" and 8.85% "No" to EU membership.

Only 1.23% of the voting slips were invalid.

"Lithuania wakes up in the European Union," said the front page of the biggest national daily, Lietuvos Rytas, on Monday.

As the overwhelming endorsement for Lithuania's EU membership plans emerged late on Sunday, President Rolandas Paksas thanked his countrymen and said the Baltic state had entered "a new stage of its history".

"Hello Europeans!" he said as he emerged from his office to host a concert in anticipation of victory. "I want to thank you all for passing a maturity exam."

"Lithuania now starts a new stage of its history in a European family," he added.

Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas and parliamentary speaker Arturas Paulauskas also sliced a big referendum cake with a large EU flag and smaller Lithuanian flag stuck in it at a large party at parliament.

Celebrations and congratulations

Lithuania is one of 10 mainly ex-communist countries on course to join the EU on May 1 2004. The Mediterranean island of Malta, along with Slovenia and Hungary, have already decided in favour of EU membership.

With a "Yes" vote in the Europhile state having been taken for granted, celebrations started several hours before the closure of polls.

Congratulations started to flow in from neighbouring countries, seeing in Lithuania's success hope for their own forthcoming popular votes.

European Parliament President Pat Cox said the referendum was an encouraging example to other candidate countries, in a midnight phone call to parliamentary speaker Paulauskas.

"It is a great night to celebrate," the Baltic News Service quoted Cox as telling Paulauskas, expressing regret he could not attend the celebrations in Lithuania and have some Lithuanian beer.

However, the "Yes" came only after voters caused a scare by leaving it until late in the day to turn out, setting alarm bells ringing that a key 50% turnout threshold needed to make the vote valid would not be met.

The polls had been held over two days to give voters more time to turn out.

Lithuania is also one of seven ex-communist countries invited to join Nato.

- AFX