Lithuania. Countdown to joining the European Union
POLITICS & ECONOMY WITH EU ACCESSION FORECAST FOR THIS YEAR, LITHUANIA IS CHECKING OFF THE LAST REQUIREMENTS ON THE LIST. STRENGTHENING RELATIONS AT HOME AND ABROAD ARE ALSO TOP PRIORITY

ALGIRDAS BRAZAUSKAS Prime Minister of Lithuania: energy and agriculture sectors are high on list priorities for reform

Lithuania is the largest and the most southern of the three Baltic states and has a population of nearly four million. In July 2001, Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas assumed power after the resignation of Rolandas Paskas, who, after just eight months in office, stepped down due to disagreements with coalition partners. Mr. Brazauskas was not a new face on Lithuanian political scene; he also served as the country's first freely elected president shortly after the country's independence in 1990. Since last summer, Mr. Brazauskas has been busy implementing the last of Lithuania's EU requirements as the country is hoping to receive an invitation to join this year. He elaborates, "The most complicated issue for us at the moment is agriculture since we had a collective farming system during Soviet times and we must complete the restitution of land ownership.

VALDAS ADAMKUS President of Lithuania: expects EU requirements to be met by the end of this year

The second issue is the harmonization of the tax system to EU standards, but we have already prepared the documents and submitted them to parliament. The third most complicated issue is that of the energy sector which was always a single economic entity but must now be split into separate enterprises. We are restructuring the sector now and we hope to have it completed by the end of December." President Valdas Adamkus agrees that Lithuania's agricultural policies will still take some time to fulfill but is optimistic that all EU requirements will be met by the end of this year. He adds, "It will probably take some years to readjust our long-term agricultural policies, but otherwise we have already closed 21 chapters of the EU requirements and the rest will meet their projected schedules by the end of 2002."

ANTANAS VALIONIS Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs: plans to boost U.S. investor confidence

NATO membership is also a top priority on the government's agenda this year. Minister of Foreign Affairs Antanas Valionis says that Lithuania is eager to secure its independence through NATO membership (which may also take place in 2002) and believes that accession will contribute to better relations with Russia. "Today, Lithuania enjoys the best international security position in its history, so one of the strategic objectives of our foreign policy is to make the positive changes that have occurred over the last decade permanent and irreversible. For us, this is best achieved by EU and NATO enlargement in our region," he comments. "NATO membership will also lead to better neighborly relations and cooperation between Lithuania and Russia. We believe that a strengthening of the international security and stability in the proximity of the Russian border not only benefits the NATO alliance and Lithuania, but also Russia itself."

Lithuania currently has strong relations with the U.S. and the U.S. is Lithuania's third-largest investor. However, the recent disagreement between the Lithuanian government and U.S.-based Williams International over its Lithuanian oil refinery operations has Prime Minister Brazauskas concerned that there may be a misperception of Lithuania's investment climate abroad. He says that the Williams case should not be misconstrued as representative of an unfavorable climate in Lithuania as the country has a long history of successful cooperation with foreign companies. He states, "I can assure you that Lithuania is indeed an open country for foreign investment and many companies, like Philip Morris for example, have improved their performance dramatically here."