The speakers of the parliaments of the three Baltic States visited Canada and the US to discuss regional security issues and cooperation, BNS reported. They met with with the speaker of Canada’s House of Commons, Greg Fergus, and members of the Canada-Nordic-Baltic Parliamentary Friendship Group. In the US, the Baltic speakers met with the speaker…
Lithuania’s Vilnius City District Court has approved a request from the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) to arrest Sarunas Stepukonis, former partner at Estonia-registered BaltCap Infrastructure Fund (BInF), BNS reports. Stepukonis is suspected of embezzling at least EUR 27mn from the fund. His current whereabouts are unknown. BaltCap has sued Stepukonis and casino operator Olympic…
Latvia’s tax revenue totalled EUR 13.414bn in 2023, which was EUR 1.188bn (9.7%) less than in 2022, according to the Finance Ministry, LETA reports. Annual tax revenue was 2.7% more than the EUR 13.058bn planned. General government tax revenue reached 2.9% above target at EUR 12.639bn, including EUR 10.514bn of state budget revenue (2.3%) and…
Estonia’s retail turnover totalled EUR 10.5bn in 2023, which was down 8% at constant prices compared to 2022, according to preliminary data from Statistics Estonia, ERR reports. The retail turnover of grocery stores declined by 4%, automotive fuel by 5%, and manufactured goods by 11% over a year.
Lithuania’s state-owned railway company, Lietuvos Gelezinkeliai (LTG), has appointed Kristina Meide as CEO of its passenger train operator, LTG Link, for a five-year term, BNS reports. Meide will replace interim CEO Gediminas Seckus. LTG Link’s previous CEO, Linas Bauzys, was appointed CEO of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (IAE) in September 2023. Prior to her…
Latvia’s Foreign Ministry called on authorities to check whether the top management of major Latvian companies and organisations include any Russian, Belarusian, or other third-country nationals who support Russia’s military aggression in Ukraine and who may have links to Russian state institutions, LETA reported. The ministry insisted that such persons should be subject to EU…
An investigation into the outage of the EstLink 2 power interconnection between Estonia and Finland has so far found no “intentional external damage” in the undersea cable, Estonian transmission system operator Elering announced, ERR reports. The exact location of the fault and the specific cause of the outage remain to be determined, however. Finnish transmission system operator…
The Baltic banking group, Luminor Bank, posted a pre-tax profit of EUR 273.2mn in 2023, which was up 92% from EUR 142.4mn in 2022, The Baltic Times reported. The Estonia-based group’s annual net profit amounted to EUR 194.7mn, which was up 56% from EUR 124.7mn a year earlier. Luminor attributed the sharp rise in profit…
Farmers in Lithuania staged a protest rally in the country’s capital, Vilnius, on 23-25 January 2024, Baltic News Network reported. Around 3,000 farmers gathered in front of the government building with over 1,500 tractors and forestry trucks blocking the city’s main street. The farmers oppose a rise in the excise duty on LPG, a ban…