Farmers clash with Belgian police

Farmers were driven back by water cannon

Farmers demanding compensation over mad cow disease have clashed with police in Belgium.

Police used water cannon and batons to force the farmers back as they tried to break through a barbed wire barricade in Brussels, the French news agency AFP has reported.

The clashes came as hundreds of farmers converged on Brussels, blocking traffic and trying to reach the European Union building where farm ministers are due to discuss the demands for compensation.

The BSE crisis is of seismic proportions - we need a decision today

Belgian farmer Etienne Ernoux

Elsewhere, roads across Belgium and northern France were blocked in co-ordinated action by the farmers, who say they face ruin over the slump in sales caused by the crisis.

The farmers say they are now facing a double-blow - with the new scare over foot-and-mouth disease adding to their woes.

In Brussels, up to 1,000 farmers joined the protest, some throwing snowballs and sticks at police.

Barbed wire and steel barricades have been erected to protect the talks venue, and up to 20 armoured police vehicles formed road blocks.

Demand for beef has crashed cross Europe

Hundreds of police were deployed, with riot squads on standby.

Main roads into Brussels had earlier been blocked by around 300 tractors.

Farmers from France are have joined the protest, driving convoys of tractors along the Paris-Brussels motorway, and on the Lille-Ghent main road between France and Belgium.

A dozen more border crossings were also targeted, the regional traffic information office said.

Agriculture ministers have no mandate to raise the budget - it would not be right for me to tell you otherwise

Swedish Minister Margareta Winberg

Farm waste has also been dumped at French ports including St Malo and Cherbourg.

Swedish Agriculture Minister Margareta Winberg met a delegation of the Brussels protesters, but told them emergency spending to prop up beef prices could not be agreed.

"Agriculture ministers have no mandate to raise the budget. It would not be right for me to tell you otherwise," she told them.

But one of the farmers in the delegation, Belgian Etienne Ernoux, said immediate action was imperative.

"The BSE crisis is of seismic proportions - we need a decision today."

French demands

France has said it will ask the meeting to agree to a compensation scheme, and hinted it might take unilateral steps if Europe-wide help is not forthcoming.

But Agriculture Commissioner Franz Fischler has made clear no new money is likely to emerge to help the farmers.

Beef sales have plunged by around a quarter across the EU since it was revealed last October that meat from infected French herds had reached supermarket shelves.

The crisis deepened when Germany's previously BSE-free herds were also found to be infected.