(PARIS) - The European Union will not call for sanctions against Russia when it meets next week for an emergency summit on the Georgian crisis, a source in the French president's office said Friday.

"We are still in a phase of dialogue with Moscow, not in a phase of sanctions," said the source in Paris, which holds the EU's rotating presidency, adding that "the time for sanctions has not yet come."

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner had said Thursday that some EU states were considering imposing sanctions on Russia when they meet at the summit on Monday in Brussels organised by President Nicolas Sarkozy.

But the source in Sarkozy's office said the 27-nation bloc would merely state "that the six-point deal must be applied in its entirety," referring to a ceasefire plan brokered by Sarkozy that put an end to fighting between Georgian and Russian forces.

The conflict erupted on August 8 after the Georgian army launched an offensive to bring South Ossetia, which broke away in the early 1990s, back under government control.

Russia has since halted its five-day long offensive into Georgia but has failed to withdraw all its troops from Georgian territory. It has also recognised the independence of South Ossetia and fellow rebel region Abkhazia.

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