LONDON -- The European Commission said on Friday that France's ship inspection record since the 1999 Erika oil tanker disaster has worsened rather than improved and falls well below the minimum mandatory number of checks.

Drawing on an independent set of just-published figures relating to inspections at European ports, the commission, the European Union's Executive, said France had fallen well below its quota for a third successive year despite previous warnings.

According to figures published by the Paris Memorandum on Port State Control (Paris MOU) this week, France inspected just 9.6 percent of ships in 2001, compared with 11 percent in 2000 and 14 percent in 1999.

Under the EU directive on port state control, aimed at stamping out decrepit and dangerous ships, countries must inspect 25 percent of ships entering their ports that are not nationally flagged.

Industry observers say the fresh figures are particularly embarrassing for the French government which vowed to tighten up regulations in the wake of the Erika tanker disaster in December 1999.

The tanker, chartered by French refiner Totalfina and carrying heavy fuel oil, broke in two in the English channel causing widespread economic and environmental devastation to the French coastline.

"It's confirmation of a trend...and what worries me most is that trend," Sergio Carvalho, an official with the commission's Maritime safety unit, told Reuters.

The commission decided in late June to take both France and the Republic of Ireland to court for failures to carry out ship inspections.

Carvalho said that decision related to previous infringements and that the latest figures strengthened the case against France.

"Ireland's record has been improving," said Carvalho referring to inspection rates since 1999.

Ireland's record has improved from 7.5 percent in 1999, 14.6 percent in 2000 and 21 percent in 2001, Paris MOU figures show.

??????Figures "Incontestable"?????? Carvalho said the figures supplied by the Paris MOU were "incontestable" and that France would now have to face the music at the European Court of Justice.

An official at the Directorate of Maritime Affairs in France said he could not immediately comment on the figures.

Paris MOU General Secretary Richard Schiferli said the matter was between the French government and the European Commission, as France had contravened European Union law and not that of the Paris MOU.

"Of course we are concerned if countries do not live up to commitments -- but the Paris MOU is not legally binding," he told Reuters.