The European Union has no plans to follow the U.S. in moving to impose wide-ranging sanctions on Syria, the European Commission said Thursday.

"It is obviously not our position, we are in the process of negotiating an association agreement with Syria," said Emma Udwin, spokeswoman for External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten.

"The policy of isolating Syria is not the most productive," she added.

In a quick reaction Wednesday, the E.U. vehemently slammed the action as a further destabilizing factor in the region, a European diplomatic source told Saudi newspaper Al-Watan.

E.U. foreign policy chief Javier Solana told U.S. diplomats in Brussels and a number of the 15-block countries that the bill will charge up tension in the Middle East and chill all attempts for language and diplomacy, said the source.

He added that E.U. Commission President Romani Prodi is to visit Egypt Sunday, October 12, to discuss means to defuse tension and return back to negotiations.

Prodi will also affirm the rejection of the U.S. stands towards Syria and urges an end of Israel’s settlement activities and provocations, said the European diplomat.

A White House spokesman said Bush has ended two years of opposition to the Syria legislation.

"Syria needs to change course, change its behavior, stop harboring terrorists," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters.

The State Department has also dropped its opposition to the bill.

"And that's what we're seeing unfold, because Syria hasn't taken any significant action against terrorist groups," Boucher said.

Washington-Damascus relations have also worsened over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

The House International Relations Committee voted 33-2 in favor of economic and political sanctions on Syria, a resolution which now has a strong chance of being passed by the full House of Representatives next week.

Passage of the bill is virtually guaranteed as three-fourths of the Senate has signed as co-sponsors alongside nearly 300 of the lawmakers in the House.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said it was long past time for Syria to pay a price for its alleged support of terrorists.

"It has become increasingly clear which side Syria’s government has chosen in the war on terror," DeLay said, accusing Damascus of funding and harboring fighters crossing its borders into Iraq to target American soldiers.

But Representative Jeff Flake, one of just two dissenting votes on the panel, stressed that "unilateral economic sanctions just never work."

"We shouldn't tie the hands of the administration like this."

If passed, the bill would empower Bush to ban various U.S. exports to Syria, specifically "dual use" commodities such as computers or fertilizers.

In addition, it would call upon the president to select two sanctions from a menu of six, a ban on all U.S. exports to Syria except food or medicine; a ban of all U.S. business investment in Syria; restriction of Syrian diplomats in Washington and at the U.N. in New York City to a 25-mile radius.