Liffe white sugar futures closed firmer on trade buying in light volumes, playing "follow my leader" with New York raws on Wednesday.
August settled up $3.8 at $216.5 in slim turnover of 1,867 lots, having moved between $216.9 and $211.7.
October ended up $4.4 at $222.5 in volume of 999 lots. Total volume was 3,585 lots.
"We have seen some trade buying against physical business," one trader said.
Another said, "Specs and locals pushed New York higher, and London is playing catch up."
Traders said some selling might have taken place ahead of Thursday's weekly EU tender.
Traders said physical sugar activity was slow this week amid a lack of demand by Russia and India, combined with ample availability of near-term supplies.
In fundamentals, Algeria's top sugar refiner Cevital SPA has in recent days bought two shipments of Brazilian raw sugar totalling some 70,500 tonnes and expects to buy over 550,000 tonnes of sugar in 2004, an executive said on Wednesday.
"Two Brazilian sugar shipments were executed in recent days - one for 34,500 tonnes and one for 36,000 tonnes - and both part of annual contracts," Cevital's head of development Malik Rebrab told Reuters in a telephone interview in Algiers.