Current EU presidency holder Greece voiced fears that relations between Europe and the United States were in serious crisis as divided EU leaders arrived for their summit on Thursday night.

Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou told an emergency debate in the European Parliament, "In our relations with the United States, we have been and are still going through a significant crisis."

He expressed regrets that the Iraqi issue had not been resolved peacefully and called for a "frank and open dialogue" with Washington to try to overcome trans-Atlantic differences and the ensure the United Nations' central role in dealing with international crises.

Papandreou also said the EU could face a new refugee problem as a result of the conflict, as it did in the 1999 Kosovo war.

European leaders seemed readiness to start healing bitter rifts among themselves on the Iraq conflict, after Britain, Spain and Italy backed the US drive to war against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, while France and Germany led the anti-war camp.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana had echoed Papandreou's view on one principle around which supporters and opponents of war could unite to ensure the UN's the central role in the post-war reconstruction and political order in Iraq.

"The United Nations should continue to be the center of gravity in the post-conflict period," Solana said.

Before leaving Rome for Brussels' EU summit, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said he would try to limit divisions in Europe "and patch up relations between the EU and the United States ... which are fundamental to global peace."

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw also urged EU nations to be united to bring humanitarian relief and reconstruction to Iraq once the war was over. But he highlighted the splits by claiming majority support for war, saying 14 of 25 present and future EU countries backed military attacks against Iraq.

As for gloomy ties among leaders, diplomats said there were no plans for British Prime Minister Tony Blair and French President Jacques Chirac, the two main antagonists in the Iraq split, to meet privately during the closed-door summit, which set to last from Thursday to Friday.

Chirac, the leader of the anti-war camp in the West, said he was deeply concerned over the Iraq war and forecast serious consequences, no matter how long hostilities lasted.

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder voiced dismay and said everything must be done to avert a humanitarian disaster.

European Commission President Romano Prodi expressed his fears over the European divisions and urged EU leaders to seek a shared ground and do more for their own defense to be less dependent on Washington.

"Whatever the outcome of the war, there can be no denying this is a bad time for the (EU's) common foreign and security policy, for the European Union as a whole, for the authority of the UN, for NATO and for trans-Atlantic relations," he said.

At the same time, the EU commission's aid chief Poul Nielson said the 15-nation bloc aimed to get humanitarian help to Iraq as soon as possible and appealed to member states and the European Parliament for approval of 106 million US dollars in emergency extra funding, after the announcement of some 20-million-US-dollaraid for Iraq by the commission, the EU's executive arm.

In an emotional parliamentary debate, Hans-Georg Poettering, leader of the center-right European People's Party, the largest faction, warned Europeans against anti-Americanism and said Saddamwas to blame for the outbreak of war. "Let's criticize the Americans less and let's ask ourselves more what we can do to be stronger so that we can influence the United States," he said.

Meanwhile, EU assembly's Socialist leader Enrique Baron, echoed by leftist and Greens speakers, urged EU governments not to join what he called an unjust, unilateral war. Liberal leader Graham Watson, who also criticized military action, said the EU would only carry weight when it had a common foreign policy with a single European seat on the UN Security Council.

As European Parliament President Pat Cox put it, "the war has begun and we enter a new and dangerous phase."

He said that one clear message which the EU parliament need to give EU leaders "is that in the months to come we must learn and apply the lessons of how to work together to create a greater coherence, a greater presence and a greater balance in terms of international affairs."

(Xinhua News Agency March 21, 2003)