Brussels - US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will Thursday listen and expose her plans for Afghanistan to eager NATO foreign ministers at a meeting that is also expected to agree on the resumption of direct talks with Russia.

The meeting in Brussels is the first by the United States' new chief diplomat, who kicks-off her maiden voyage to Europe with a transatlantic dinner hosted by the Belgian government on Wednesday evening.

Brussels - NATO on Wednesday welcomed the rejection by the Afghan Independent Election Committee of calls for early elections, saying the scheduled August 20 date would give the alliance enough time to provide the necessary security during the vote.

While it is a "100 per cent Afghan decision," NATO and its secretary general "welcome this decision by the Independent Election Committee," said NATO spokesman James Appathurai.

Brussels - The countries that use the European Union's single currency, the euro, are so divided on the question of issuing common bonds that there is no realistic chance of creating them at present, the EU's top official said Wednesday.

"The idea is interesting, but there is very, very clear opposition from a large number of member states," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso told journalists in Brussels.

Brussels - The European Union's top official on Wednesday challenged member states to set up an EU-wide system for overseeing its financial markets at once, rather than waiting three years as originally proposed.

A report published last week by former International Monetary Fund chief Jacques de Larosiere called for the creation of such a system after three years' trial, but "we say this should be done immediately," European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso said.

Brussels- The European Union on Wednesday scaled back its monitoring of Microsoft in a case concerning the software giant's publication of key communication codes, saying that the company's good behaviour meant that full-time supervision was no longer needed.

Brussels  - The European Union stands ready to bail out eurozone members in the "unlikely" event that they experience severe financial problems, officials in Brussels said Tuesday.

"In the unlikely event - and I stress in the unlikely event - that a euro area country were to experience financing difficulties, a solution would be found," said Amelia Torres, spokeswoman for EU Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia.

Torres was reacting to media reports quoting Almunia as saying the EU had drawn up confidential plans to help euro members at risk of defaulting on their public debt.