Strasbourg, 29/09/2011 (Agence Europe) - Ahead of the eighth ministerial WTO conference on 15-17 December, EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht is pessimistic about the prospects of reaching a basic agreement in Geneva as a prelude to more detailed Doha Trade Round talks. “We tried to find a solution for Doha. We have repeatedly tried to make proposals so that we could have a final decision on the Doha package. We have made interim proposals with respect to the industrial sectors, chemicals, machinery and microelectronics, but you need two to tango. We simply could not reach an agreement. I have to come to the conclusion that, for the time being, the US are out of business with respect to the Doha negotiations”, said the EU trade commissioner at a hearing at the European Parliament on Tuesday 27 September. He explained: “Pascal Lamy has been putting forward an interim package (Ed: for the world's poorest countries) for December. Unfortunately, I think that there again we will fail, not because we have not been making proposals - we have been making numerous proposals - but simply because we cannot reach an agreement on that. That is where we are. We tried to find a way out and it is extremely difficult.” (EH/transl.fl)