Lithuania's empty presidential campaign

For the daily Lietuvos Rytas the election of Dalia Grybauskaite as president of Lithuania was striking not only because it marks the first time a woman will hold the office: "The voters were extremely passive. In fact it's surprising anyone came out to vote at all. These had to be the strangest elections since the reintroduction of democracy. There was practically no campaign, there were no debates and not even any posters on the streets. ... Above all, however, Russia has never spent so little on elections in Lithuania. And even the result was Russian through and through: the decision as to who would win was taken in advance from above. All the citizens had to do was confirm it."

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