"The drop in emissions, while positive, must be viewed in context," said EEA executive director Jacqueline McGlade. "It represents a decrease over only one year and may not be representative of the trend over a longer period."

The reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in 2005 brought the decrease to the Kyoto Protocol's reference year of 1990 to 1.9 percent.

Under the international agreement for cutting fighting climate change, the 15 countries are supposed to cut their emissions by eight percent over 2008-2012 period compared to 1990.

The 12 countries that joined the 27-member European Union in 2004 and 2007 are not subject to the same constraints because of their lack of economic development compared to the 15 older members concerned by the study.

When taking into account figures from the full 27 nation EU, greenhouse gas emissions already fell in 2005 eight percent from 1990 levels, mainly due to the closure of dirty factories in the bloc's former communist members.

The Copehagen-based agency said that the data, the latest available, were preliminary and figures would be published for each country in mid June.

However, it said that the biggest reductions had been made in Finland, Germany and The Netherlands.

Fighting climate change has climbed high on the EU's political agenda recently and the bloc agreed in March to cut emissions of heat-trapping carbon gases by 20 percent by 2020, compared to 1990 levels.

It has offered to deepen this to 30 percent if other major polluters follow suit.

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