But US Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade Grant Aldonas said that Europe must also come into line with WTO rulings, singling out the thorny issue of hormones.

"We've got to clean up our act with respect to compliance with the WTO. The president has been very consistent in saying that we've got to comply with our WTO obligations," he told reporters in Brussels.

Speaking after making an address on EU-US trade issues, he rebuffed specific questions about a transatlantic row over US steel tariffs, saying the decision is on the desk of President George W. Bush.

Bush imposed the tariffs in March 2002, saying duties of up to 30 percent were needed to protect ailing US steel mills as they restructured. The WTO has ruled them illegal, and the EU is threatening massive sanctions if they are not lifted.

"The choice he has in front of (him) has as much to with the statute under which he looks at whether or not the (steel) industry is restructuring," said Aldonas. But he added: "Certainly the fact that there's a WTO ruling has got to play on that decision as well."

But he added that the need for WTO compliance "is true for Europe too on things like the hormone ban" -- referring to an EU ban on the use of certain growth-promoting hormones used by the US and Canada in its beef production.

The WTO ruled in 1999 that the US and Canada could slap higher tarrifs on certain EU products after condemning the EU ban, but the 15-nation bloc claims the sanctions are no longer justified as it has conducted full scientific studies, which identify a risk in the hormones for consumers, and established a new directive that satisfies WTO rules.