EU communications ministers have failed to break a deadlock over further liberalisation of postal services in Europe, pushing back a decision until the second half of the year.
The impasse at the meeting in Luxembourg reduces the chances that the proposed opening of the market for delivering ordinary letters in the EU will go ahead as planned.
Germany had hoped to reach a compromise before its EU presidency finished at the end of this month, but its finance minister Michael Glos acknowledged that agreement would probably only be found during the subsequent Portuguese presidency.
While about a dozen member states are ready to go ahead with more market opening, the issue is deeply contentious in many other countries and postal workers in some EU states staged stoppages and rallies against the plans on Wednesday.
The European postal sector was opened to competition 10 years ago for the delivery of packages weighing more than 350g. The measure was extended in 2003 to items of more than 100g and in 2006 to letters weighing more than 50g.
The European Commission has proposed to do away with state monopolies for the delivery of letters weighing less than 50g by 2009 while guaranteeing postal delivery services throughout each country.
Britain, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden have already opened their postal market to competition.
