Rail Baltic Route Through Lithuania Up to the EC, Says Ansip
Estonian PM Andrus Ansip said after a meeting of Baltic leaders on Monday that the question of whether to stretch the Rail Baltic track to Vilnius is for the European Commission to decide, not Estonia.
The prime minister told ERR radio that the decision should not hold back the project as the deadline for EU funds is looming.
Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevičius said that the capital Vilnius, which accounts for 40 percent of the nation's GDP, should not remain unconnected.
Ansip said that the application for EU funding must be handed in in May at the latest, adding that Lithuania initially made the decision to only include Kaunas, as they would have built a lucrative logistics center in the city, where goods would have been loaded onto trains running east on Russian rail gauges.