Google and Europe Near Deal BRUSSELS - Google's antitrust troubles in Europe moved closer to settlement Tuesday after the European Union's top competition official accepted the company's latest offer to settle a long-running case concerning its search and advertising businesses. But Joaquín Almunia, the E.U. competition commissioner, said Google's rivals should be given an opportunity to respond to the proposals. That means that the process of reaching a final agreement with Google would probably last until spring 2014. Mr. Almunia said it was still possible that efforts to reach a negotiated agreement could break down, leaving him with no choice but to send Google formal charges. "The settlement route remains the best choice," Mr. Almunia said at a meeting of digital companies and lobbyists at the European Parliament in Brussels. He has been seeking a settlement with the company since the early stages of the case, which formally began in 2010. A settlement in Europe would allow Google to escape a potential fine of up to $5 billion and a finding of wrongdoing that could limit its activities in the future. The company has already settled a similar case in the United States. The case revolves around claims that Google has abused its dominance in the Internet search and advertising field by, among other things, favoring its own products and services in search results. Google powers 90 percent of searches in many European markets; its share in the United States is closer to 70 percent. Among the new elements that Google had offered to open up competition was "an option to bid for each specific query so smaller search operators can be displayed," Mr. Almunia said. In July, Mr. Almunia was forced to reject a preliminary settlement struck with Google after industry groups complained that aspects of the deal could strengthen, rather than loosen, Google's hold in Europe. That proposal would not have required the company to change the algorithm, or formula, that produces its search results. But it would have been the first time Google had agreed to legally binding changes to its search results, and it went much further than the minor concessions it made to settle a case before the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Almunia said Tuesday that he was not seeking to regulate "a specific algorithm" or prevent the company from improving its services. Google portrayed its latest offer as something it only agreed to under considerable pressure from the European authorities. The European Commission had "insisted on further, significant changes to the way we display search results," Kent Walker, a senior vice president at Google , said in a statement that was issued shortly after Mr. Almunia finished speaking. "While competition online is thriving, we've made the difficult decision to agree to their requirements in the interests of reaching a settlement," said Mr. Walker.