Africa rejects EU trade deals

LISBON (Reuters) - Most African leaders refuse to accept Economic Partnership Agreements demanded by the European Union and want to negotiate different accords to replace them, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade said on Sunday.

"We are not talking any more about EPAs, we've rejected them ... we're going to meet to see what we can put in place of the EPAs," Wade told reporters on the second and final day of an EU-Africa summit in Lisbon.

The Senegalese president said he had led stiff opposition by the majority of African leaders against the accords at the summit, which had been called to forge a new cooperation partnership between Europe and Africa.

Minutes after saying the EU would not take the political decision to raise the tariffs, European Commission spokesman Amadeu Altafaj said this remained a legal possibility.

"From a legal point of view there is this possibility (to raise tariffs), but we have to take a political decision," Altafaj said, adding that EU foreign ministers meeting on Monday would consider the issue.

Altafaj had earlier said: "There will not be a unilateral decision by the European Union to raise tariffs on January1, but there will be legal uncertainty, any non-African country can go to the WTO with a complaint."

The least developed African countries will not have tariffs raised on their exports to the EU, because they have different arrangements than middle income countries like Cameroon and Ghana.

The EU has been pressing developing countries to sign the new trade deals, or temporary accords instead, before December 31, when a World Trade Organization waiver on preferential trade with the European bloc expires.

African governments and anti-poverty campaigners say vulnerable African economies will suffer from the impact of the end of preferential trade with the EU.

Wade's assessment that most African leaders rejected the Economic Partnership Agreements sent European officials scrambling to respond.

"I agree with this spirit of creating a new relationship (with Europe), but we have to define what that relationship is," Wade said, adding: "It's clear that Africa rejects the EPAs".

(Reporting by Pascal Fletcher, editing by Mary Gabriel)