(RIGA) - Lithuania's foreign minister said Tuesday there were "very few" obstacles to agreeing a mandate next week for talks on boosting the EU's ties with Russia, despite Vilnius' earlier objections.

"The (EU-Russia) partnership and cooperation agreement is a very important instrument," the minister, Petras Vaitiekunas, told a news conference.

"Very few things remain to be solved and we hope to adopt the mandate at the next meeting" on May 26, he said, following talks with his Estonian, German and Latvian counterparts.

EU foreign ministers are to focus on the mandate at the meeting next Monday.

Last month ex-Soviet Lithuania vetoed EU attempts to launch talks on a new "Partnership and Cooperation Agreement" with energy-rich Russia.

Vilnius demanded a string of issues be spelled out in the EU's negotiating mandate, including Russian cooperation over energy supplies, a probe of killings by Soviet troops in Lithuania in 1991, and the resolution of "frozen conflicts" in two other former Soviet republics, Georgia and Moldova, where Moscow is accused of backing separatists.

Any of the EU's 27 member states can impose a veto if it feels its national interests are threatened.

Vaitiekunas said blocking the strategic talks with Russia was "a necessary step" for Vilnius.

"Estonia is glad that Lithuania pointed out to a lot of difficult issues between EU and Russia, we could add to that list," Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet said. "Yet we believe it is better to negotiate and find solutions."

"We are close to approving the mandate," said Latvian Foreign Minister Maris Riekstins, adding it would happen in the "foreseeable future."

On Saturday, Guenter Verheugen, number two in the European Commission, said that new EU-Russia partnership talks would get the green light in time for a June 26-27 EU summit with Russia in Siberia.

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