VILNIUS, Dec 12, BNS � Zivile Pinskuviene, the mayor of the Sirvintos district, was elected as the new leader of the Lithuanian Labor Party on Sunday.

In a secret ballot in Kedainiai, central Lithuania, Pinskuviene was supported by 354 delegates of the party's congress. A total of 654 ballot papers were issued prior to the vote.

"I thank you for the confidence. (�) This is not a nomination, this is responsibility. Thank you, you are my power, I take pride in you and we will go up," the party's new leader said in her address to the audience.

The Labor Party has had no leader since resignation of MEP Valentinas Mazuronis following the unsuccessful parliamentary elections in October. Vytautas Gapsys was the party's caretaker chairman, however, decided to cease his membership in the wake of the results of the Sunday's vote.

The Labor Party, which was part of the ruling coalition in the 2012-2016 parliament, failed to cross the required five-percent threshold in the October elections and only has two members in the current parliament, i.e., Valentinas Bukauskas and Petras Cimbaras elected in single-member voting. Both MPs joined the Social Democratic Party's political group.

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