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Lithuanian Parliament Removes Country's President After Casting Votes on Three Charges

The Lithuanian Parliament removed President Rolandas Paksas from office on Tuesday, ending a political scandal that has roiled the country for nearly six months even as it celebrated its new membership in NATO and the European Union.

The Parliament, or Seimas, ousted Mr. Paksas less than 14 months after he took office, voting on three counts that he violated his oath and the Lithuanian Constitution through his dealings with a Lithuanian-Russian businessman suspected of links to Russian organized crime.

Mr. Paksas, 47, became the first European leader to be removed from office by the impeachment process. The Parliament's speaker, Arturas Paulauskas, a political rival, took over as acting president after the voting, pending a new election that by law must be held within two and a half months.

All along Mr. Paksas, a flamboyant stunt pilot and populist politician, denied the charges, accusing his opponents of exacting political revenge for his unexpected victory in a presidential runoff in January 2003.

Appearing before Parliament as it prepared to vote, he sounded contrite, acknowledging mistakes but saying that none merited his impeachment. ''I do not feel guilty,'' he said.

His remarks did little to persuade Parliament to grant him leniency. And his behavior of late, often seen as erratic and temperamental, only worsened his prospects for political survival.

As the vote neared, he appointed the businessman at the center of the scandal, Yuri Borisov, as a special adviser and then reversed himself within hours, saying he had been pressured by Mr. Borisov.

The ouster comes less than a month before Lithuania is to cement its place in Europe by joining the European Union, a tremendous accomplishment for a country that regained its independence from the Soviet Union less than 13 years ago. A week ago it officially became a member of NATO, welcoming the arrival of four Belgian F-16's to patrol the skies over the Baltics.

Many in Lithuania have viewed the scandal as a sign of the strength of the country's nascent democracy, albeit an embarrassing one.

Despite the political turmoil -- heightened by an undercurrent of fear about Russia's meddling in the country's affairs -- the impeachment process did little to distract the country from its principal economic and foreign policy goal of joining Europe's elite club of nations. Lithuania, eager to demonstrate its commitment to NATO and the United States, has also deployed troops to Afghanistan and Iraq.

''The democracy of Lithuania is proven,'' Vytautas Landsbergis, the first president of post-Soviet Lithuania and one of the parliamentary deputies who voted against Mr. Paksas, said in a telephone interview. ''We are able to cope even with such a problematic situation. And we did it in an absolutely peaceful and constitutional way.''

Mr. Paksas, the third post-Soviet president, was accused of improperly restoring citizenship to Mr. Borisov, the owner of a helicopter manufacturer, Aviabaltika, which has been accused of illegal arms sales to Sudan. Mr. Borisov contributed $400,000 to Mr. Paksas' presidential campaign, and in exchange, according to parliamentary investigators, received preferential access to the president's office.

Calls for his impeachment intensified after the country's State Security Department reported last fall that he had also leaked classified information to Mr. Borisov about investigations into his dealings. Mr. Paksas also faced a third charge of interfering in a privatization deal.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 12 of the National edition with the headline: Lithuanian Parliament Removes Country's President After Casting Votes on Three Charges. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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