The head of the IMF has called on EU governments to boost the size of their rescue fund and consider financial risk-sharing steps such as common eurozone bonds as a way out of their sovereign debt crisis.

SO our half-Minister for European Affairs Dick Roche is in action again.

Facing rising violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, US President George Bush is pressing European allies for more help in a rush of high-stakes diplomacy amid growing public impatience with the war.