Brussels, 16/03/2004 (Agence Europe) - On 9 March, the Council of Ministers of the EU adopted, by qualified majority (Denmark and Sweden voted against) the regulation "modifying regulation (EC) 384/96 on protection against dumped imports from countries not members of the European Community and regulation (EC) 2026/97 on protection against subsidised imports from countries not members of the European Community". The aim of this new regulation is to clarify how decisions are made between Member States in instituting definitive anti-dumping or compensatory measures under trade protection instruments. In the approach used until now, a Commission proposal was only adopted if the simple majority of Member States voted in its favour. Abstentions were taken into account as the votes in opposition to the proposal, and it was possible for a proposal to be blocked on abstentions. In order to resolve this, the new regulation requires a simple majority of Member States of the Council to reject a proposal to bring in definitive measures; under this procedure, measures will be considered adopted unless the Council decides by simple majority to reject it within a month, starting from its presentation by the Commission (see EUROPE of 9 March, p.8, on the press conference by European Commissioner for Trade, Pascal Lamy).