Brazil, EU negotiators to meet on Doha-spokesman

BRASILIA, July 9 (Reuters) Brazil's foreign minister will meet with European negotiators at the end of next week in a last-ditch effort to move stalled global trade talks forward, a presidential spokesman said today.

''In principle, EU negotiators, Portuguese participants and obviously German negotiators will participate,'' presidential spokesman Marcelo Baumbach told reporters.

The venue for Foreign Minister Celso Amorim's meeting with European negotiators was not set, and it was not clear whether US officials would participate in the talks, Baumbach said.

President Luiz Inacio Lula agreed to the meeting proposed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a telephone conversation between the two today.

Brazil is one of four leading players in the World Trade Organization's Doha round of negotiations, alongside the United States, the European Union and India.

Talks between the four to reduce farm aid and tariffs on manufactured products collapsed last month in Potsdam, Germany.

Lula said today that a deal was still possible but that poorer nations ought to benefit more than wealthier countries.

The Doha round was launched in the Qatari capital in 2001 with the aim of boosting global trade flows and helping poorer nations export more.

WTO chief Pascal Lamy has said if an agreement is not secured soon, the talks could be put on ice and would remain so until after the US elections in 2008 when Washington may have more flexibility to negotiate than in the run-up to the vote.

Reuters SZ SBA VP0320