A European Union trade negotiator has expressed optimism that Brunei, Singapore and Thailand could sign separate trade pacts before the present trade commissioner's mandate expires in October next year.

Renate Nikolay, a member of EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson's cabinet, said that ideally, she expected the three Asean members to finish exchanging offers for goods to be covered by the pact by next month. That would pave the way for further discussions between Mr Mandelson and his Asean counterparts in December at the sidelines of the Asean summit in Bangkok.

Mr Mandelson, however, announced plans to resign his post to rejoin the government of Gordon Brown over the weekend. The Financial Times reported on Saturday that Baroness Cathy Ashton, Labour's leader in the House of Lords, won the support of Jose{aac} Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, to take his portfolio. Her appointment to Brussels may be temporary and may not be extended when its current mandate expires in 2009.

Negotiations on services, investment, and rules of origin have yet to begin, said Ms Nikolay.

''Talks with Asean are an important project for my commissioner. Since his first meeting with the Asean counterparts in Halong Bay (Vietnam) in 2005, we've found a lot of bumps including the Burma issue and the different levels of economic and social development among Asean members. Therefore we have to get the architecture right to launch a trade negotiations process,'' she said.

The EU is a late partner at the negotiating table with Asean after China, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. As it did not want to see the others get the best deals, it wanted to pursue comprehensive deals on more than goods on the bilateral basis, she conceded.