Lithuania is ready for "open confrontation" with the rest of the European Union over the terms of an EU mandate for opening partnership negotiations with Russia, the country's foreign minister said.

EU President Slovenia wants the mandate to be rubber-stamped by foreign ministers of the 27-member bloc in Luxembourg next Tuesday, allowing negotiations with Moscow on a wide-ranging pact to begin by the time of an EU-Russia summit in June. But ex-Soviet Lithuania is demanding any mandate include assurances on energy supplies, Russian cooperation over a missing Lithuanian businessman, and movement by Moscow on unresolved 'frozen conflicts' in former Soviet republics.

Lithuanian Foreign Minister Petras Vaitiekunas confirmed Slovenia made compromise proposals yesterday but insisted Vilnius would demand the mandate issue be stripped from the agenda of Tuesday's meeting unless its demands were fully met.

"I have told Slovenia that I will demand taking the issue of a mandate off the agenda of the EU foreign ministers' meeting," he told the Lithuanian parliament's European Affairs committee.

"That is going to be an open confrontation with the EU presidency, as well as with the other EU member states." Vaitiekunas said Lithuania was ready for compromise but had the right to demand assurances on its energy security and on Russia's cooperation in criminal cases, some dating back to the early 1990s.

Justice Demand

"Why can't we demand justice in these cases when Britain could bring up the case of Litvinenko?" he added, noting that the negotiating mandate already reflects British concerns about Russia's refusal to extradite the chief suspect in the November 2006 poisoning in London of ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko.

Negotiations with Russia, covering trade, energy, human rights and political cooperation, were to have been launched in November 2006 but Poland vetoed the mandate after Moscow barred imports of fresh food products from Warsaw.

Poland recently dropped its veto after Russia lifted the embargo, but Lithuania has since stalled agreement with its list of concerns.

Vaitiekunas said discussion of the mandate could be put off till a new EU foreign ministers meeting in May.

However, the EU's Slovenian presidency was upbeat about chances of agreement.

"I can't say that it will be signed until it is signed ... but I think we are moving forward and have established good ground," one presidency source in Brussels said.

Diplomats said new EU presidency proposals made on Thursday sought to meet Lithuanian demands for assurances on the Druzhba pipeline which carries Russian oil through Ukraine and Belarus to Europe, and on judicial cooperation. They added the presidency would pursue consultations with Lithuania in the run-up to Tuesday's meeting.