Geneva: Unity between India and Brazil is crucial to break the deadlock and resist attempts to divide developing countries at world trade talks, a former Indian trade negotiator said here Friday.

"The effort of the United States and the European Union has been to create division. India and Brazil, who have very different interests, must resist such attempts for the sake of all developing countries," Atul Kaushik, a senior former commerce ministry official, said.

Kaushik told IANS known differences among members of the influential Group of 20 developing countries (G-20) should be kept out of the negotiating room at the World Trade Organization here.

Kaushik, who has negotiated for India on intellectual property rights and environment, named India and Brazil in particular as the countries with divergent interests in agriculture.

Brazil has "offensive agricultural interests" - where it would like all countries, including India, to lower tariffs and other barriers to its farm exports.

India, on the other hand, has "defensive interests" in agriculture, which means it would like to retain as many of these tariffs and barriers as possible in order to protect the lives of its estimated 600 million small farmers.