Cyprus goes to the polls on May 25 to elect six members of the European Parliament, with the elections being considered the most important European elections to date, as the EU seeks to pull through the economic crisis and EU leaders reflect on what direction to take in future.

This is the third time Cyprus, with a population of 0.8 million, is voting in the European elections, since it joined the EU as a full member state in May 2004.

The deadline for submitting candidacies in Cyprus is May 2.

The European elections will be held from May 22 to 25 in all EU member states, to elect a total of 751 MEPs, to represent their interests for the next five years.

There have been 766 MEPs since Croatia joined the EU in July 2013 but this number is being scaled down at the 2014 elections to 751 and will stay at that level in future. These MEPs will represent over 500 million citizens in 28 member states. The seats are allocated among the various states, by the EU treaties, on the basis of `degressive proportionality`, meaning countries with larger populations have more seats than smaller ones but the latter have more seats than strict proportionality would imply.