(AFP) – Oct 16, 2008

BRUSSELS (AFP) — Two months after the war in Georgia and a day after a false start to peace talks, EU leaders were not yet ready Thursday to negotiate upgrading ties to reflect Russia's hydrocarbon superpower status.

Instead, after a two-day summit in Brussels, they put off making the decision in time for an EU-Russia summit on November 14 in France, allowing the bloc's leaders to digest an exhaustive report currently being drawn up.

The 27-nation bloc had suspended talks in September on the so-called Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) after Russian troops and tanks rolled into Georgia on August 8 to push back a Georgian offensive to retake the breakaway republic South Ossetia.

Russia has since withdrawn from most of Georgia in line with an EU-brokered ceasefire but Tbilisi is furious at the continued presence of 7,600 Russian troops in South Ossetia and Abkhazia and Russia has sparked international condemnation for its recognition of the two pro-Moscow regions.

"The PCA will resume once the analysis, the evaluation that is being done by the Council (of EU ministers) and commission is finished," EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana told reporters in Brussels. "I hope very much that will be before November 14."

EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said Thursday she planned to present her report to a meeting of EU foreign ministers on November 10.

The partnership agreement, talks for which began in July, is aimed to update the framework for relations between the two sides to reflect Russia's new-found economic clout. Current ties are governed by an agreement dating back to when Russia was reeling from the break-up of the Soviet Union.

France, which now holds the EU's rotating presidency and whose president Nicolas Sarkozy brokered a six-point ceasefire deal between Russia and Georgia, had hoped to announce the resumption of the talks at the Wednesday-Thursday Brussels summit -- an aim supported by Italy and Germany among others.

But several other EU members including Britain, Poland, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Batlic state Lithuania and Sweden have said it is too early to re-start the talks.

Polish President Lech Kaczynski, whose country blocked the partnership talks from starting in the first place because of a Russian embargo on Poland's meat exports, said Thursday a resumption would be "very risky and a victory for Russia."

"I am firmly opposed," Kaczynski said.

Nonetheless, Solana's comments were underlined in conclusions EU leaders were due to finalise Thursday, which said the bloc "welcomes the withdrawal of Russian troops" from Georgia.

It also said they welcomed the launch in Geneva of talks between the two sides, even though these broke down on their first day Wednesday with the Russian and Georgian delegations refusing even to be in the same room.

Sarkozy said Wednesday he was "not surprised" about the breakdown but that he would not give up on the process, in comments echoed by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Europe's Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which co-hosts the talks with the United Nations and the EU, urged patience, with chairman Alexander Stubb saying the "most important thing" was that another date -- November 18 -- had been set.

That would come eight days after Ferrero-Waldner is due to present her analysis of relations to a meeting of EU foreign ministers, but officials took pains to point out no links existed between ties and progress on the Georgia talks.

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