Malta said to be still in the running to host Medicines Agency

Malta, which already hosts the European Asylum Support Office, wants to host the European Medicines Agency. So does Cyprus, which is one of the five EU members that currently does not have an agency in its territory.

Only four out of the 27 remaining EU member states do not want to host any of the two EU agencies currently located in the United Kingdom: Slovenia, and the three Baltic states – Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

On Tuesday, EU affairs ministers met in Luxembourg to discuss the procedure for deciding where to locate the EBA and EMA after the UK's exit from the EU.

Some twenty member states have said they wanted the EMA, whereas six said they would like to host the EBA – some want both..

The decisions not to make a bid are mostly based on an assessment of their chances.

“We have evaluated our chances, looked at it realistically,” said a Lithuanian diplomatic source, noting that the conclusion was not to make a bid for the agencies.

Another diplomatic source said the same about Lithuania's Baltic neighbour, Latvia.

The Latvian cabinet had a discussion about the possibility, and decided that the competition would be too heavy.

“We realistically looked at what a proposal would look like. It was just not feasible,” said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.