Brussels, 26/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - The ambassadors of the Fifteen, meeting within the Committee of Permanent Representatives of Member States to the EU (Coreper) on Wednesday, did not manage to agree on the ways to trigger the European Fund for natural or other disasters. Coreper will return to the issue on Friday. The differences were over the regulation's field of application. Some Member states pleaded in favour of an extension to technological or environmental disasters, whereas several others (including the "net contributors to the budget", plus other large countries) considered that only natural disasters should be eligible for aid. Other difficulty: whether or not to consider a region eligible when damages are within the ceiling provided for but that a "significant" share of the population has been affected, as the Commission proposes. Furthermore, a majority of Member states could agree to the Presidency compromise raising to 3 billion euro (against 1 billion in the initial proposal) or the equivalent of 0.6 to 0.7% of national GDP (the Commission proposed 0.5%) the ceiling of damage justifying Community intervention (yesterday's EUROPE page 9 and 18 September, p.8).