<B>TAIWAN?S</B> parliament has agreed to present to a full house today a motion to revise the election law to allow for a recount that could end the deadlock over the weekend?s disputed closely fought presidential election.

The breakthrough agreement at a parliament committee meeting that had been scheduled, cancelled and rescheduled could mark a major step toward ending a political crisis that has threatened to paralyse policy-making in one of Asia?s most vibrant economies.

A day earlier, President Chen Shui-bian offered to meet defeated Nationalist leader Lien Chan if thousands of protesters massed outside his office to demand a recount dispersed. Lien said those conditions were unreasonable, insisting a meeting was possible to discuss his loss ? by just 30,000 votes, or 0.2 percent, out of 13 million cast ? while the protests continued.

He wants an immediate recount and an explanation of a mysterious assassination attempt against the president on the final day of campaignig last Friday when he was slightly wounded.

The Nationalists agreed at a committee session with lawmakers of President Chen?s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) after several days of wrangling to present the election law revision to a full house, said Liao Fung-te, party whip for the Nationalist Party. ?The committee ruled to put the election law revision into the agenda of Friday?s discussion,? Liao told the meeting. But other members of the opposition, which holds a majority in parliament with its allies, voiced caution about passage of the motion, which proposes an immediate retroactive recount if the margin of victory in an election is one percent or less.

?We still have the content of the revision to debate and everyone has to agree. It?s not over yet,? said Nationalist lawmaker Sun Kauo-hwa.

Chen had proposed breaking the stalemate by revising the election law retroactively, but the depth of mistrust between the pro-independence president and Lien, also defeated by Chen in 2000, had prevented progress.