Brussels - European Union socialist leaders said Thursday they oppose the appointment of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair as the bloc's next president.

"We have a clear preference for the (post of) high representative," said Martin Schulz of the European socialists grouping after a meeting of left-of-centre prime ministers ahead of an EU summit in Brussels.

The general understanding is that if the post of foreign policy high representative goes to a socialist, the post of European council president should go to a conservative. Blair would be unlikely to accept the weaker of the two posts created by the reforming Lisbon Treaty.

Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, head of the socialist grouping in the European Parliament, said Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero had been asked to negotiate a deal with their conservative counterparts over the coming fortnight.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whose Labour Party also belongs to the European socialist family, has publicly backed Blair.

The president is elected by qualified majority for a term of two and a half years, renewable once. (dpa)