Estonia’s President, Alar Karis, has declared elections to the European Parliament to be held on 9 June 2024, ERR reports. Registration of candidates will begin on 10 April 2024 and early voting on 3 June 2024. Parties can nominate up to nine candidates each. Altogether 912,000 voters in Estonia are registered for the elections, ERR…
Estonia’s ruling coalition plans to lower the country’s voting age in all elections to 16 years, ERR reports. The coalition has agreed on cutting the minimum voting age in elections to the European Parliament. Under the plan, teenagers would be able to vote in European elections in 2029. The coalition parties want to cut the…
The chairmen of the foreign affairs committees of the Baltic parliaments, Estonia’s Marko Mihkelson, Latvia’s Rihards Kols, and Lithuania’s Zygimantas Pavilionis, praised Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections held on 13 January 2023, LSM reports. In a joint statement, they said that the elections demonstrated the strength of Taiwan’s “robust democratic system,” saying that the country…
Latvia’s Foreign Minister, former prime minister Krisjanis Karins, would like to become a European Commissioner if he fails to win the race for the post of Secretary General of NATO, LETA reports. Latvia’s ruling New Unity party has yet to decide whether to name Karins or Latvia’s current EU commissioner, Valdis Dombrovskis, to top the…
The parliamentary group of Estonia’s opposition Estonian Centre Party (Keskerakond) will find it hard to recover from the exodus of MPs from the party, ERR’s Uku Toom estimates. The parliamentary group has dwindled from 26 MPs a year ago to just 7 today. The faction is therefore unlikely to have representatives in all parliamentary committees…
Lithuania’s 2024 presidential elections are approaching, with the incumbent, Gitanas Nauseda, being the clear favourite for re-election, LRT reports. The main intrigue lies in whether there will be a second round of voting. Besides Nauseda, five candidates from political parties and five independents have declared their intentions to run. The list includes notable figures like…
Latvia’s Union of Greens and Farmers (ZZS), which is part of the country’s current coalition government, will continue to cooperate with former Ventspils mayor Aivars Lembergs despite him having been sentenced to prison for corruption, LSM reports. Harijs Rokpelnis, chairman of the ZZS parliamentary group, pointed out that the court verdict had not entered into…
Latvia’s Riga Regional Court has sentenced former Ventspils mayor Aivars Lembergs to four years in prison and confiscation of property, LSM reports. The second-instance court found Lembergs guilty of taking bribes, money laundering, unauthorised participation in a property transaction, and falsification of documents. At the same time, the court acquitted him of charges of concealing…
Regional branches of Lithuania’s ruling Homeland Union (TS-LKD) have proposed their preferred candidates for president in the upcoming elections in May 2024, BNS reports. Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte was the favourite with 66 nominations, followed by Foreign Minister and TS-LKD chairman Gabrielius Landsbergis with 64 and Labour and Social Security Minister Monika Navickiene with 62….