AFP - European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso announced the nominations for his new team Wednesday, with conservatives to the fore and more women members than the outgoing EU executive.

"I am pleased to have received nominations from all member states. Now it is my job to allocate the right portfolios to the right people," Barroso said.

"I look forward to presenting a strong commission team to the European parliament," which will vet all the commissioners in January.

Barroso recently secured a second five-year term at the head of the EU executive, which helps draw up and police European law.

He now has to distribute the policy portfolios under pressure from national capitals for plum posts, particularly in the economic and financial sphere.

"There is always pressure, but at the end of the day it's up to me to take the overall responsibility," Barroso said recently, and political horse-trading has been going on behind the scenes for some time.

Each EU nation will be allotted one commissioner.

Barroso's new team

So far only Portugal and Britain know what they will get, with former Portuguese PM Barroso satisfying the former and British peer Catherine Ashton being handed the EU's new foreign policy supremo post last week, a position which will makes her a commission vice-president.

Dutch Prime Minister Peter Balkenende did his lobbying out in the open on Tuesday, letting it be known that the Netherlands candidate Neelie Kroes, the current EU competition commissioner, should take up a new technology post.

The biggest EU nation, Germany, has nominated Guenther Oettinger, head of the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg.

France has named former minister Michel Barnier, currently a Euro MP.

Sweden, which holds the rotating EU presidency till the end of the year, has named Europe minister Cecilia Malmstroem who has become a familiar figure in the corridors of Brussels.

Bulgaria has put forward its serving foreign minister, though Rumiana Jeleva has only held the post since the summer.

Of the 27 national nominees, 13 (including Barroso) come from the conservative wing, along with eight liberals and six socialists, despite the fact that the latter are the second largest group in the European parliament.

They can at least count in their ranks Ashton, who will leave the trade job for her new foreign policy role with a massive diplomatic corps beneath her.

She is also one of nine female nominees on the list, one more than served in the outgoing commission.

Twelve of the old team have been named with Barroso in his new line-up.

The new EU executive team will begin work in February, as long as the parliament has no strong objections.

While Barroso was announcing his new team, Belgian prime minister Herman Van Rompuy formally quit his job in preparation to become the first EU president.

His diplomatic role is separate from the commission and was created, like Ashton's, by the bloc's reforming Lisbon Treaty aimed at giving Europe a stronger voice internationally.