The United States Trade Secretary, Mr William M. Daley, has warned of the danger of a fullscale trade war between the US and the European Union unless Washington and Brussels can agree a joint strategy in advance of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in Seattle later this month. Speaking to 150 CEO's from Europe and the US at a meeting of the Transatlantic Business Dialogue (TABD) in Berlin, Mr Daley promised to do all he could to overcome remaining differences between the two sides.

But the EU Trade Commissioner, Mr Pascal Lamy, acknowledged that it would take "a great deal of work" to find agreement over such issues as beef raised with growth hormones, GM foods and feature films.

A meeting last week in Washington between President Clinton and the president of the EU Commission, Mr Romano Prodi, failed to resolve the remaining disputes and some business leaders in Berlin were clearly frustrated at the politicians' lack of progress.

"Calls for tariff barriers - from whatever side of the Atlantic - are nothing other than the expression of a fundamental lack of trust in the entrepeneurial spirit," said Mr Juergen Schrempp, chairman of DaimlerChrysler.

The TABD has drawn together top managers and politicians from both sides of the Atlantic each year since 1995, to discuss how to improve the conditions of world trade.

There were calls for harmonisation of technical standards, notably in the field of mobile telecommunications. The managers also supported the introduction of a single, worldwide accounting system offering greater transparency, protection for investors and lower costs.

Much of the discussion focused on the future of e-commerce, with most managers warning of the danger of over-regulation while acknowledging the need for strict standards of data protection to encourage consumer confidence.

Mr Daley said e-commerce is one of the areas still in dispute between the US and the EU, along with environmentally harmful emissions and Washington's proposal for anti-dumping legislation to regulate steel imports. The managers present in Berlin identified a number of other potential disputes, over the EU's rules on dumping old computers and Brussels' ban on animal experiments for cosmetics.

The last round of world trade talks lasted eight years but Mr Jerome Monod, chairman of Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux, one of the joint chairmen of the conference, expressed the hope that the round starting in Seattle on November 30th would be over within three years.

The German chancellor, Mr Gerhard Schroeder, wants the WTO talks to agree on basic social standards such as banning child labour. But many of those gathered in Berlin at the weekend feared that introducing such an element might overburden a round of talks that already appears challenging.