DAVOS, Jan 27: Leading trade ministers meeting in Davos on Saturday gave stalled global trade talks a lift when they backed the quick resumption of negotiations. The Doha round of World Trade Organisation talks was suspended in July by WTO Director General Pascal Lamy because of deadlock between the European Union, the United States and developing countries.

After a meeting of ministers from 24 key trading nations on Saturday, the Swiss economics ministry reported “a strong wish for a quick resumption of full scale activity in Geneva”, the headquarters of the WTO.

However, there was no sign of a substantive breakthrough and Lamy called on all sides to make compromises for the sake of the developing world.

“We’ll need a new American offer on agricultural subsidies, a new one from the EU in agricultural tariffs and new Indo-Brazilian offer on industrial goods and services,” the WTO chief said after the meeting.

The Doha round was launched by WTO members in the Qatari capital Doha in 2001 with the aim of reducing trade barriers for the benefit of poor countries.

The move back to full-scale negotiations would require the approval of all 150 WTO members.

“We must tell the world that the Doha round is not dead,” EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson told the ministerial meeting, according to a statement released to journalists.

Brazilian trade representative, Foreign Minister Celso Amorim, said he felt more optimistic and suggested there was now more urgency than at any other in the five-year-long talks.

“My sense of the meeting was a positive one,” he said. “I left with a higher feeling of optimism.”

”I think I also detected a clear sense of urgency, which maybe was not present before.”

The round has been a focus of attention at the World Economic Forum, which concludes Saturday after four days of discussion about the world economy, climate change and development.

Key countries including India and the United States had played down hopes of an immediate breakthrough in trade talks, although they hinted at some progress in informal bilateral meetings in recent weeks.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and South African President Thabo Mbeki all called for progress during their appearances here in the Swiss mountains.

Lula, an influential member of the G20 group of developing countries in the WTO, said that Brazil was willing to make concessions.

However, he was only ready to persuade the G20 to accept a deal if the EU and United States bridged their gap over farm subsidies and tariffs first.

In the European Union, the French government in particular has insisted that the EU should not make any new offer to reduce import tariffs on farm products, a key bone of contention with the United States and developing nations.

In his statement on Saturday, Mandelson said the EU was ready to improve its offer on agriculture “in the right circumstances”, to move closer to the demands of the G20.

Lamy signalled that an offer from the US was on the horizon.

The Doha round has also received support from business leaders here in Davos, with about 60 chief executives and chairman endorsing a statement calling for the frozen talks to get moving again.

“A number of business people who had not been active have started realising that they should raise this on their own agendas,” Lamy said.—AFP