Some EU accession states worry about giving up independence so soon after winning it from the Soviet Union, writes Derek Scally
The Eurovision Song Contest is the best propaganda weapon Brussels never invented. This year's kitschfest, hosted by Estonia and won by Latvia, has done more to increase support for EU enlargement in the Baltic region than anyone thought possible.
It's a surprise considering Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are the biggest EU sceptics among the candidate countries, according to European Commission surveys.
Politicians in the region believe EU membership is the only way back to Europe after a brutal half-century occupation by the Soviet Union and a decade of difficult reform. But many people wonder why their governments are so anxious to give away their sovereignty just a decade after winning it back.
Before voters in the Baltic countries decide on EU enlargement next year, however, Irish voters will have their say.
Ireland's referendum next month could cause a dramatic swing in public opinion in the Baltic countries, according to local officials.
Last year's rejection of the treaty was a shock and was perceived locally as one small country that has benefited from EU membership sticking the knife into possible competitors for EU funding.
It's likely that a second No vote will be perceived the same way.
With the date set for Ireland's second Nice Treaty referendum, the Baltic governments are very careful not to say anything out of place.
"If nothing else, Ireland's Nice Treaty referendum shows people there and here just how democratic the EU can be, because look how much noise one small country can make in such a large institution," said one government official in Estonia.
People in the Baltic countries are well informed of the benefits of EU membership, such as structural funds, farming subsidies and barrier-free work and travel. But whenever the EU is mentioned here, the word "security" follows inevitably in the same breath.
"At the end of the day, people in Latvia will vote Yes simply for security reasons," said Mr Edvards Kuners, director of the European Integration Bureau in Latvia.
"The EU provides security that will prevent the Baltic countries being dragged away from the West again."
Despite the perceived benefits of joining the European Union, people in the Baltic countries are some of the most sceptical about membership. The Eurobarometer survey, released by the European Commission in March, found that, of the three, Lithuanians were the most upbeat about the EU, with 41 per cent of the population in favour of joining. Just one in three support EU membership in Latvia and Estonia.
Approximately one-third of people in the three countries have no opinion on EU membership.
Latvians are the most negative, according to the survey, with 17 per cent expressly against the EU, while in Estonia and Lithuania the anti-EU feeling is 14 and 11 per cent respectively.
If the three countries held a referendum on EU membership tomorrow, only Lithuania could be sure of a majority in favour, the survey found.
Perhaps it's no coincidence, then, that people in the Baltic countries felt the least well informed of all the first-wave candidate countries questioned.
"When you talk about the European Union here, older people just hear the word 'union', immediately think of the Soviet Union, and run the other way," said Mr Morten Hansen, a Danish economist based in Riga, the Latvian capital.
The suspicion is reflected in the Eurobarometer survey, which shows that less than one-quarter of people in Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia trust EU institutions.
EU accession negotiations with the Baltic countries have proceeded relatively smoothly and are on track to be completed by December. Like all candidate countries, the Baltic countries had their own issues of concern. Lithuania is still negotiating with the EU on how to finance the shutdown of a nuclear power plant similar to the Chernobyl reactor in Ukraine. In Latvia, the EU accession process has proved an incentive to sort out issues surrounding the country's Russian-speaking non-citizens, who make up nearly half the population. Estonian government officials say that the EU negotiation process has provided a structure for the modernisation the country had to go through anyway.
Agricultural subsidies is one of the most emotive issues for the three countries, where Soviet collectivisation has left an inefficient agricultural sector with no strong lobby and which now faces an uncertain future in the common market.
Few farmers in the Baltic countries are expecting a financial bonanza, but the proposal to phase in direct payments at 25 per cent to farmers in accession countries caused anger and disgust all the same. In Latvia, the offer was seen as a breach of trust by Brussels that offended the Latvians' sense of fair play. "It is not about the money, it is about the principle of not being treated like an equal," said Mr Kuners.
The same feeling is common in the Estonian agricultural sector, though farmers there have fewer worries about joining the EU. The government threw open its markets a decade ago, abolishing all trade tariffs. Joining the common market will level the playing field for Estonian meat and dairy products in the crucial EU and Russian markets.
"Estonian farmers have been through hell in the last 10 years. Those who survived until today will survive in the EU, no problem," said Mr Toomas Kevvai, an official in the Estonian Ministry of Agriculture.
The governments of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania plan to put the question of EU accession to voters in a joint referendum this time next year.
The last time people in this region came together was on August 23rd, 1989, when over two million formed a 600-kilometre human chain stretching from Tallinn to Vilnius to mark the 50th anniversary of the Non-Aggression pact. The pact, between Nazi Germany and the USSR, sealed the fate of the three Baltic countries, which after the second World War were swallowed up by the Soviet Union.
When people here come out next year, they will decide whether or not to join another, very different union.
Talk of subsidies and the common market is important here, but will be insignificant alongside the referendum's historical significance. As one government official in Riga put it: "We think we should be readmitted into the family we were born into."