TALLINN, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Estonia's government gave its final backing on Thursday for a decision to sell its minority stake in Eesti Telekom to the Nordic region's biggest telecoms firm, TeliaSonera.
Estonia, aiming to plug its budget deficit and keep on track to euro adoption in 2011, is selling the shares to TeliaSonera at 93 kroons ($8.75) a share, but is also going to get an extraordinary dividend this year.
"The decision to sell was considered crucial as the Estonian state has no strategic interest in being a telecom company shareholder and the state will collect in 2009 more than 4 billion kroons ($376.5 million), which reduces the borrowing requirement and improves the general government budget balance by 518 million kroons," the government said in a statement. ($1=10.624 Estonian Kroon) (Reporting by David Mardiste; Editing by Jon Loades-Carter)