Despite a high rate of approval for the European project, Lithuanians appear to have little interest in the country’s first stint at leading the rotating presidency of the EU, starting 1 July, Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevičius told  READ MORE

The governing Civic Platform (PO) party will have a draft legislation ready next week that will eliminate political party financing from the state budget, Prime Minister Donald Tusk told reporters Wednesday. READ MORE

Taking over the EU Council Presidency, Lithuania will focus on pursing credible, growing and open Europe, country’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Linas Linkevičius said at the launch event of the Official Guide to the Lithuanian EU Council Presidency, hosted by the Permanent Representation of Lithuania to the EU together with Hill+Knowlton Strategies on 13 June. READ MORE

During the Cold War, Romania confused all of us. Long after brutality in other communist countries declined, Romania remained a state that employed levels of violence best compared to North Korea today. Nicolae Ceausescu, referred to by admirers as the Genius of the Carpathians, ruled Romania with a ruthless irrationality. Government policies left the country cold and dark, and everyday items readily available just a few kilometers south in Bulgaria were rarities in Romania. At the same time -- and this was the paradox -- Romania was hostile and uncooperative with the Soviets. Bucharest refused to submit to Moscow, and this did not compute for many of us. Resistance to Soviet power, in our minds, meant liberalization, like what we saw in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. But not in Romania; Romania played a different game. READ MORE