BRUSSELS, Belgium — The European Union head office on Monday has threatened to take 11 EU countries to court unless they introduce new rules to tackle noise pollution.

Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal and Britain were supposed to draft national laws to deal with environmental noise by 18 July 2004.

They now have two months to bring in rules to map noise "hot spots" and make sure local people are more involved in government efforts to reduce noise.

If they take no action, the European Commission can take them to the European Court of Justice and order them to pay a fine.

Source: Associated Press