OREANDA-NEWS. February 17, 2014. Arenijus Jackus, the head of the Department of International Relations at the Lithuanian Ministry of Transport, said the Rail Baltic Vilnius connection could be constructed at a later stage.

Jackus told ETV that the first step would be to finalize the joint company and create a project plan, that would consist of more than one stage of construction.

A recent viability study by AECOM found that extending the Rail Baltic line from its initial plan to include Vilnius would not make economic sense.

Head of the company's Baltic office, Arnis Kakulis, said that a high-speed rail-link between Kaunas, which is on the planned Rail Baltic route, and Vilnius already exists.

Lithuania unveiled a plan to direct the Rail Baltic route through Vilnius, in addition to the initial destination of Kaunas, in December, angering both Estonia and Latvia, who had hoped to move forward with the initial plan and submit funding applications to the EU.