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Cicinskas, Jonas
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3 articles of this author have been cited in the European Press Review so far.
Lithuania is doing well in the EU
Jonas Cicinskas considers how Lithuania has changed in the three years since it entered the EU. "We remain to no small degree 'post-Soviet,' but the changes have started. Particularly when it comes to our geo-political position. We are on the edge of the EU, but Lithuania is now part of the economic and political structure of Western Europe. Our country and its politicians have an easier time making themselves heard. Their decisions have greater impact than was the case in independent Lithuania between the wars or before its entry into the EU. The free trade with EU member states has attracted investors from all corners and brings us greater prosperity."
» full article (external link, Lithunian)
More from the press review on the subject » EU enlargement, » Lithuania, » Europe
Lithuania and the euro
Owing to an inflation rate that is approximately 0.1 percent higher than that stipulated by the Maastrich criteria, Lithuania is not to be permitted to introduce the euro as planned on January 1, 2007. Jonas Cicinskas comments bitterly: "All previous experience with the EU shows that conformity with certain criteria is mainly a question of political interpretation to serve the purposes of EU leaders. This was the case with the creation of the Economic and Monetary Union, the Stability Pact and the Convergence criteria... Although candidate countries were required to fulfill the Copenhagen criteria for the last round of EU enlargement, there was one tacit condition which everyone knew about: no one was to join the EU before Poland did, because this was Germany's strategic interest... Lithuania's joining the Eurozone would not have posed a threat to anyone."
» full article (external link, Lithunian)
More from the press review on the subject » EU enlargement, » EU Policy, » Lithuania, » Europe
Introduction of the euro in Estonia and Lithuania
Estonia and Lithuania want to introduce the euro in 2007. However, the British "Financial Times" reported a few days ago that the EU Council of Finance and Economic Ministers plans to find a formal pretext for rejecting these two countries' applications to join the monetary union at the conference where the matter is to be decided in June. According to the newspaper, the real reason is that Estonia and Lithuania are too poor. Jonas Cicinskas points out that "poor and rich" are flexible terms. Although Lithuania's gross domestic product for 2004 stood at just 48 percent of the EU average and Estonia's at 51 percent, this shouldn't be the deciding factor, he writes. "It depends on the nature of a country's economy. If it's small and entirely dependent on export and import, and has learned to make do without an independent financial policy and has long ago stopped manipulating exchange rates, then it shouldn't be a problem for such an economy to join a monetary union."
» full article (external link, Lithunian)
More from the press review on the subject » Economy, » Lithuania
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