TRALEE (Ireland). Sept « European Union foreign ministers united today In condemn ing Washington's trade sane tions against Cuba. Libya and Iran but were at odds in weekend talks over US bombing raids on Iraq, reports Reuter.

They bristled at US legislation which could punish some European firms for operating in any nation on Washington's trade hit list but said they were unlikely to take retaliatory steps until after the US presidential elections in November.

Ministers from the 15-na-tion bloc condemned Saddam Hussein's incursion into Kur dish areas of northern Iraq last week, calling on him to pull back his troops, but failed to send Washington the kind of backing it gave after Iraq’s 1990 Kuwait Invasion.

"We securea a significant measure of agreement on the situation in Iraq," host Dick Spring, the Irish Foreign Minister. told a news conference at the end of the talks.

But Irish officials acknowledged that the failure to back the Clinton administrations bombing of Iraq reflected a divergence of views which ranged from France s lukewarm response to Britain's enthusiastic support.

They also backed the reinstatement of an agreement allowing Iraq to sell limited amounts of oil to buy food and medicine as soon as the United Nations Secretary-General, who suspended the agreement, judges it right to do so.

Spring held out the possibility that the EU might remain involved in Bosnia, which brought the horrors of war to the EU's doorstep, for another two years after elections this year.

He said there was a need for a continued civilian and military" presence during a two-year consolidation period after the elections and the end of the NATO peace force's mandate in December.

"Everything so far has been easy compared with what lies ahead," said Carl Bildt, the international community's representative for Bosnia, who briefed EU ministers on the reconstruction of the country on Saturday.

The EU appeared to back down from a confrontation with Israel over its plans to send a fact-finding trio of ministers for talks with the PLO in its Orient House offices in disputed east Jerusalem.