Voting going smoothly in Malta's first EU election

Polling opened Saturday in Malta's first-ever European elections amid high expectations that the EU's smallest nation will have the highest turnout of any of the 25 participating states, the electoral commission said.

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi voted early at his village, Marsascala, 10 kilometres (six miles) south of the capital Valletta, but made no comment as he exited the polling station with his wife Catherine.

A total of 27 candidates are vying for the five seats allocated to the Mediterranean island state, where almost 300,000 people are eligible to vote. Local council elections in 22 districts -- concerning one third of the electorate -- are being held simultaneously.

Balloting was proceeding normally and election officials said they expected a 25 percent turnout by noon.

The voting rate is expected to increase after evening mass on the overwhelmingly Roman Catholic archipelago. .

Gonzi's ruling Nationalist Party and the opposition Labour Party have predicted voter participation in the mid-80s.

However, more than 10,000 voters, mainly from Nationalist Party areas, have not collected their voting documents -- five times the number that went uncollected before last year's general election.

Polling stations opened at 7:00 am (0500 GMT) and were to close at 10:00 pm.

Latvia and Italy were also voting in EU elections on Saturday, whereas voters in the Czech Republic headed into a second day of polling.

It is the third poll for the Maltese in 15 months, with 53.6 percent voting 'yes' to EU membership in a referendum in March last year, a result confirmed by a victory for the Nationalists in a general election a month later which was dominated by the membership issue.