Lithuania's centre-right Peasants and Greens Union claimed victory Sunday after the second round of parliamentary elections, according to dpa. The Peasants and Greens Union won 54 of the 141 seats in parliament, according to the Lithuanian election commission, and will begin negotiating with other parties to form a coalition government. The party's chairman, Ramunas Karbauskis, declared himself open to either a centre-left or a centre-right coalition. "I think the Social Democrats and the conservatives are potential partners," Karbauskis said. The conservative Homeland Union, which led after the first round of voting, won 31 seats, making it the second-largest party. Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius' ruling Social Democratic Party, won just 17 seats. The Social Democrat's populist coalition partners - the Order and Justice party and the Labour Party - won eight and two seats respectively. Two weeks ago, in the first round of voting, the Peasant and Greens Union and the opposition conservatives were tied for first place, while the party of Butkevicius slipped markedly in popularity. Butkevicius' coalition government had been hit by a number of corruption scandals in recent months, which cost it in the polls. Some 2.5 million voters were eligible to vote in the poll to decide the final 68 seats in the country's unicameral parliament, the Seimas.
