GENEVA, Dec 12: The top EU trade official said on Friday the WTO must engage with US president-elect Barack Obama to try to clinch a global trade pact after negotiations at the end of this year failed.

“We should continue the work and engage with the new US administration in January to see how quickly a ministerial meeting can be called in 2009,” EU trade commissioner Catherine Ashton said in a statement.

World Trade Organisation Director-General Pascal Lamy said earlier Friday he would not be summoning ministers to Geneva next week as he had initially hoped, because of an “unacceptably high” risk of failure and wide gaps between states.

But Ashton urged the WTO to keep striving for a deal.—AFP