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."

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