Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus, speaking after a meeting with his Polish counterpart Lech Kaczynski, said that they "came to the commitment that the electric bridge has to be built, and will be built."

The two countries had been expected to sign the grid deal on the sidelines of a wider energy conference in Lithuania this week.

Adamkus said the accord was likely to be ready "before the end of this month" and had simply not been signed "for technical reasons" related to setting down the structure of the consortium which is to build the link.

"I have no doubt, and no basis to doubt, that one of our countries is insincere," Adamkus added.

At a joint press conference, Kaczynski told reporters he also expected the deal to be settled "in the near future."

"We are going to have the power bridge," he said.

Last week, Vilnius was left bemused when Poland's Economy Minister Piotr Wozniak warned that Poland could go slow on the grid unless it got a guaranteed 1,200-megawatt share of the output of a new nuclear power station which the two countries are planning to build in Lithuania.

In what appeared to be a nod to Wozniak's comments, Kaczynski said that "Poland has to get a certain number of megawatts from Lithuania", although he did not elaborate.

The power grid link, which is meant to be online by 2010, is seen as a crucial way to help Lithuania cope with the planned closure of its Soviet-era nuclear Ignalina power station, which provides around three quarters of the country's electricity.

Lithuania pledged to shut down the plant by 2010 as part of its membership talks with the European Union, which it joined in 2004 along with its fellow Baltic states of Latvia and Estonia, and Poland.

The link with Poland would eventually enable Lithuania to tie its grid to the power systems of western Europe.

Poland and the Baltic states had this week also been expected to sign a deal on the new nuclear power plant.

The four countries plan to spend 2.4-4.0 billion euros (3.4-5.6 billion dollars) on building the new plant, which could have a maximum capacity of 3,200 megawatts.

Earlier Wednesday, Lithuanian Prime Minister Gediminas Kirkilas told AFP that plans to ink the deal had been postponed.

"It is most likely that the agreement on the construction of the new nuclear power plant will be signed in November, after the elections in Poland," Kirkilas said.

Kaczynski's conservative party is currently locked in a knife-edge battle with the liberal opposition, as Poland's October 21 parliamentary elections loom.

The Baltic states, which regained their independence when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, are still linked to Russia's power grid and rely heavily on its energy sources.

Like ex-communist Poland, they see the new plant as a way to reduce Moscow's clout.

The new power station is meant to come on stream by 2015, although some experts have suggested that 2017-2020 is a more realistic target, and that Brussels should allow Lithuania to delay closing Ignalina to avoid electricity shortages.

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