Ireland has not asked for EU bailout: Juncker

(LUXEMBOURG) - The head of the Eurogroup of finance ministers, Jean-Claude Juncker, said Friday that Ireland had not asked for bailout assistance from eurozone partners.

The Luxembourg prime minister gave a resounding "No" when asked during a news conference if Ireland had called in help from the European Financial Stability Fund, set up in May to protect debt-laden eurozone economies.

"If Ireland asked for help, it would get it from the EFSF. But the question has not been asked," he said, echoing similar denials from the Irish government and the European Commission in Brussels.

"We made no application whatever for funding," Prime Minister Brian Cowen said.

"We have funding up to mid-year (2011) because of the pre-funding arrangements done by the National Treasury Management Agency."

Finance Minister Brian Lenihan also maintained that Dublin was well-funded until mid-2011 and that the government did not need to apply for a bailout.

He said the goal was to establish a four-year plan to cut a deficit that has crossed 30 percent of GDP this year and to pass a December 7 budget that contains 6.0 billion euros (8.2 billion dollars) in spending cuts and tax rises.

"We will have to hold our nerve through this very difficult period," Lenihan told RTE state radio.

"This country is not in a position where it is required in any way to apply for the facility... It doesn't seem to me to make any sense. It would send a signal to the markets that we are not in a position to manage our affairs ourselves."

The problems in Ireland, with fresh panic striking markets when Irish government bond yields shot through the roof this week, are the top issue on the agenda for eurozone ministers meeting on Tuesday in Brussels.

Any concrete request first goes to the Eurogroup, but asked if preparatory discussions were under way, as was the case before a bailout request was formalised for Greece in the spring, Juncker said such discussions would remain private.

"When it comes to interviews with my colleagues, these are not conducted in public," Juncker said. "However, there is nothing serious underway," he underlined.

Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain issued a joint declaration at the G20 summit in South Korea on Friday insisting that bond market jitters were misplaced.

At the summit on Thursday, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said the EU was prepared to stand by Ireland and had "all the necessary instruments in place" to do so.

In Brussels, commission spokesman Olivier Bailly also stressed that no request had been received and refused to comment on behind-the-scenes preparations.