Lithuania Begins Impeachment Proceedings Against President

The Lithuanian Parliament launched impeachment proceedings Thursday against President Rolandas Paksas over charges that his office had connections with organized crime, setting up the small Baltic nation for a potentially paralyzing political fight on the eve of its admission to NATO and the European Union.

Paksas critics said they already have collected signatures from 86 lawmakers in favor of impeachment, one more than the number needed to topple the 47-year-old president of the former Soviet republic. The impeachment process could take as little as two months.

“On the whole, we can say that today the impeachment procedures have begun,” Arvydas Zilinskas, spokesman for the parliamentary speaker, said in a telephone interview. The signatures presented to the legislature Thursday, he said, are “a very strong message.... It is an indication that the Parliament took a very resolute stand on impeachment.”

Whether the process will be completed remains to be seen; the country’s most influential political parties, church leaders, mayors and other civic groups have all called for the president to resign. But Paksas, who was elected president in January, appears for the moment to be digging in.

“I did not come to the presidential post only to resign because of some articles, or someone’s wishes,” he told state radio last week.

In an interview Thursday, Paksas’ aide Antanas Martusyavichus said Thursday’s impeachment proceedings had not changed the president’s mind.

“The impeachment will take place. And we will see. The president is not afraid of 86 signatures,” Martusyavichus said. “He is ready for this ordeal. He doesn’t feel guilty.”

Paksas appears to be counting on the next step in the process: The 141-member Parliament will appoint a 12-member special impeachment commission -- half legislators and half lawyers -- to determine whether the president violated the constitution and his oath of office. Of the legislators, four are expected to come from those who signed the impeachment petition.

“The commission will analyze the charges thoroughly and come to the conclusion that they are groundless. The commission must prove that he is innocent,” Martusyavichus said.

If the commission does not find substance to the charges, the Parliament can either agree and drop the proceedings or appoint a new commission.

“Right now, these 86 signatures juridically don’t mean much. But it is a signal to the president there is a majority in Parliament which wants to know the truth,” said Eligijus Masiulis, an opposition leader.

The crisis began in late October, when the national security department said it had materials suggesting that some of the president’s closest aides had ties to international criminal organizations. Authorities have also raised questions about Paksas’ relationship with a Russian businessman, Yuri Borisov, who allegedly has links to Russian intelligence services. Borisov’s helicopter repair company, AviaBaltika, was investigated for illegal arms trading with Sudan.

Borisov was the chief financial backer of Paksas’ election campaign, and he was awarded Lithuanian citizenship shortly after Paksas became president.

An ad hoc parliamentary commission also found evidence that Paksas leaked secret law enforcement information to targets of a criminal investigation.

The president has said all of the charges are groundless and, in a televised address to the nation last week, said he couldn’t rule out that a campaign had been launched to prevent Lithuania’s entry next year into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the EU -- an issue that has been an irritant for Russia.

Many analysts agree that a full impeachment proceeding, which could take as long as six months, is likely to delay moves to bring the nation’s laws into conformity with European standards and hamper Lithuania’s foreign relations, which under the constitution must be conducted jointly by the government and the president.

Prime Minister Algirdas Mykolas Brazauskas has repeatedly called for Paksas to resign.

“There are certain concerns that Lithuania may experience some difficulties in the process of joining NATO. But I think it would be much more difficult for us to become a full-fledged NATO member if we didn’t resolve this issue,” Masiulis, the opposition leader, said.

“This would make us all doubt whether we can be trusted by our future NATO partners with sensitive, confidential information,” he said.

“How can we be trusted in this respect if one of the accusations against the president is that the confidential information the president received from Lithuania was leaked, either by him or through his entourage, to persons who were supposed to have no access to such information?”

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Times staff writer Sergei L. Loiko contributed to this report.