ERM II stirs up Prague’s quiet man<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Published: 02 August, 2004<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Lithuania, Estonia and Slovenia joined ERM II at the end of June and are expected to meet the criteria in 2007.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->But accession countries of a larger size are facing a very different scenario, as Vienna-based RZB bank pointed out recently: “Protracted high budget deficits that will probably not meet the Maastricht deficit criteria of less than 3% of GDP before 2006 have pushed the prospect of adopting the euro for these countries back to 2009 or 2010 as long as the technical requirements for becoming a member of the eurozone remain unchanged.”,<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--> [broken link removed][broken link removed]