BUDAPEST: Poor countries had the most to lose from the World Trade Organisation's (WTO) failure last year in Seattle to set a new round of trade talks, WTO Director-General Mike Moore said on Friday.

Moore, speaking at a business conference in Budapest, also said that the trade bloc would be immensely strengthened by the admission of China, whose anticipated entry into the WTO is viewed with some scepticism in the United States.

"Make no mistake: the world's poor are the real losers from Seattle,'' Moore told the International Chamber of Commerce.

"We owe it to them not to let them down,'' he said.

A WTO conference last December in Seattle, marked by violent demonstrations against the organisation, broke down amid sharp differences between the EU and the US on issues such as agriculture and industrialised and developing countries.