The Czech Republic voted overwhelmingly to join the EU, paving the way for entry to the bloc of wealthier Western states 15 years after a "Velvet Revolution" toppled communist rule.
Preliminary results of a two-day referendum, issued this afternoon, showed 77.3 per cent of those who voted want to join the EU, making the Czechs the seventh of 10 candidates to vote in favour of joining the 15-nation Union in May 2004.
The vote set the stage for Prague to achieve its biggest foreign policy goal since the fall of Communism in 1989 in what was then Czechoslovakia - now split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Many of the other EU applicants are also former Soviet-bloc countries.
"Today's vote puts an end to the results of the Second World War. We have come back to where we are strong and have great opportunities," Prime Minister Mr Vladimir Spidla told journalists after seeing the results of an exit poll by the SC&C agency.
Turnout was a low 55.2 per cent, but there was no minimum turnout requirement for the referendum to be valid, contrary to some applicant countries which experienced cliffhanger votes.
Mr Spidla said the result gave the government, which has a narrow one-vote majority in the 200-seat lower house, a stronger mandate to carry out key policies such as reforming public finances, needed for the eventual adoption of the euro.
Poland, Hungary, Lithuania, Slovenia, Malta and Slovakia have already approved EU entry in referendums. Estonia, Latvia and Cyprus are the other applicant states.
Opinion polls leading up to the vote had predicted strong support for EU entry, but not without some hesitation. Many have seen rising living costs erode the value of social benefits.