Following the final decision of the European Union General Affairs Council of Ministers on Lithuania's participation in the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) from 1 January 2015, Chair of the Board of the Bank of Lithuania Vitas Vasiliauskas calls on Lithuanians to do not rush to exchange litas to euros.

Ministers at today's European Union's General Affairs Council gave final approval for Lithuania to join the eurozone on January 1, Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics announced on Wednesday.

Ryanair, Europe's favourite low fares airline, today, 18 July, celebrated its 15th millionth passenger to/from the three Baltic countries – Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania. The lucky passenger was Ms Sima Vaskelyte who was on her way to Bremen. A celebration was held at Vilnius airport where Ms Vaskelyte was presented with a Ryanair flight voucher from Vilnius to a destination of her choice and cupcakes were served to all passengers departing on a Ryanair flight this morning.

The Ministry of National Defence is beginning a mechanisation programme to implement the National Defence System Development Programme 2014-2023 approved by the Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania and to the end of strengthening and modernising the Lithuanian Land Force. In first phase of the programme two battalions of the Mechanised Infantry Brigade (MIB) Iron Wolf will be equipped with modern wheeled infantry fighting vehicles till 2020.

Recent elections for the European Parliament have shown that people in the EU were increasingly worried about policy-making while demanding more effective approaches. Regional Policy is one of the areas where the EU is reaching out to citizens. European regions hold the key to the EU's future prosperity: the new Regional Policy is now better equipped to help European regions become more competitive.

The low-cost airline Ryanair carried its 15-millionth passenger on flights to/from the Baltic States today.

20 years passed since Lithuanian film was last shown in one of the most prominent film events, Locarno International Film Festival (Festival del film Locarno).

In Vilnius, the representatives of national road administration directorate from Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia signed the Memorandum of Understanding and Intentions in the field of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) related to the national traffic management systems and development of the Via Baltica road corridor.

Lithuania's Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius introduced to Parliament primary tasks of the Cabinet. He promised that pensions, social benefits and public sector salaries will be increased starting the year 2015.

Ryanair, Europe's favourite low fares airline, today (14 July) launched its brand new app making it even easier for customers to browse, book, check-in, board and fly on Europe's lowest airfares.