After several hours of closed-door talks, the Council agreed to defer further formal discussion until next week.

After a few hours of closed-door talks, Ms. Hanover, 52, was looking cheerier.

The slow pace of the proceedings over the last 18 months attests to that, and the closed-door talks of the last few days here proved difficult.

Buried within the 1986 tax reform bill was Amendment 423, one of many measures protecting special interests inserted during closed-door talks.

Yet over the last several days Mr. Shamir's aides have said he plans to begin holding closed-door talks with selected Palestinian leaders sometime soon.

The negotiators had met for five hours this morning on the sixth day in closed-door talks on China's entry into the World Trade Organization.

But no agreement was reached after several hours of closed-door talks, and the Council deferred further formal discussion until next week.

Johnson called for open negotiations over the debt ceiling, saying that the closed-door talks were 'outrageous' and 'disgusting.

Today's announcements followed closed-door talks that began on Friday.

"The political pull in Northern Ireland is not toward the center but away from it," said a principal in the closed-door talks.