FINLAND: The opposition Centre Party was on course to win Finland's general election last night, opening the way for the appointment of the first female prime minister in a country which already has a woman president.
With 99 per cent of the votes counted, projections from the national broadcaster YLE gave the Centre Party 55 seats in the 200-member parliament, seven more than it had in the outgoing assembly.
Prime Minister Mr Paavo Lipponen's Social Democratic Party (SDP) was projected to win 53 seats, two more than at the last election, while the Conservative Party looked like the biggest loser with 40 seats, down from 46 in the last parliament.
The key election issues have been how to revive a sluggish export-driven economy and reduce stubbornly high unemployment, a legacy of the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Finland's giant neighbour.
Ms Jaateenmaki has seized on the failure of the SDP-led coalition to achieve its target of halving unemployment, among the highest in the EU.
In a militarily non-aligned nation whose 5.2 million people are mainly hostile to war in Iraq she has also scored points by arguing that Mr Lipponen (61) is too close to the US position on Iraq.
If Ms Jaatteenmaki, a 48-year-old former minister and lawyer, is elected prime minister, Finland will become the first EU member-state to have women as both prime minister and president, following Ms Tarja Halonen's election in 2000.
A Centre Party-led government would probably not mean drastic changes in economic and foreign policies, although it is less EU-friendly than the SDP. - (Reuters)