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After months of denials, a short Eurogroup Statement shows Spain will submit a formal request to Brussels for a bailout.  Here is the statement in full. The Eurogroup supports the efforts of the Spanish authorities to resolutely address the restructuring of its financial sector and it welcomes their intention to seek financial assistance from euro area Member States to this effect. The Eurogroup has been informed that the Spanish authorities will present a formal request shortly and is willing to respond favourably to such a request. The financial assistance would be provided by the EFSF/ESM for recapitalisation of financial institutions....

Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said Sunday he would travel to watch the country's Euro 2012 soccer opener in Poland, just one day after Spain announced it would seek international help to rescue its stricken banks. "I am going because the Spanish team are world champions and I think it is good that the head of government be at this inaugural game," Rajoy told a news conference.

Ireland wants to renegotiate its rescue plan to benefit from the same treatment as Spain, which looks set to win a bailout for its banks without any broader economic reforms in return, European sources said on Saturday. "Ireland raised two issues: one is the need to ensure parity of the deal with Spain retroactively on its bailout from EFSF," one European government source told AFP, referring to the temporary rescue fund, the European Financial Stability Facility. Another European government source confirmed the information. Ireland secured an 85-billion-euro ($112 billion) rescue deal from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund...

The Bundestag approved the expansion of the eurozone bailout fund by a huge majority on Thursday. Chancellor Angela Merkel breathed a sigh of relief as 315 government MPs voted her way, averting a damaging revolt.

The three-pronged deal would set up a massive fund to create a "firewall" around the most indebted eurozone countries, allow for an "orderly" Greek default on at least some of its liabilities, and bail out European banks most at risk from debt. German and French officials came up with the strategy which aims to end the eurozone's sovereign debt crisis before it spirals completely out of control, plunging the world back into recession. The likely deal came ahead of a major new setback for the British economy - with BAe Systems, Britain's biggest manufacturer, poised to cut 3,000 jobs. Whitehall...

Mrs Merkel has cancelled a high-profile trip to Russia on September 7, the crucial day when the package goes to the Bundestag and the country's constitutional court rules on the legality of the EU's bail-out machinery. If the court rules that the €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) breaches Treaty law or undermines German fiscal sovereignty, it risks setting off an instant brushfire across monetary union. The seething discontent in Germany over Europe's debt crisis has spread to all the key institutions of the state. "Hysteria is sweeping Germany " said Klaus Regling, the EFSF's director. German media reported that the latest...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel no longer has enough coalition votes in the Bundestag to secure backing for Europe's revamped rescue machinery, threatening a consitutional crisis in Germany and a fresh eruption of the euro debt saga. Mrs Merkel has cancelled a high-profile trip to Russia on September 7, the crucial day when the package goes to the Bundestag and the country's constitutional court rules on the legality of the EU's bail-out machinery. If the court rules that the €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) breaches Treaty law or undermines German fiscal sovereignty, it risks setting off an instant brushfire across monetary union....

Champions of the European Project can claim a dubious vindication. They never wavered in their faith that EU states would yield sovereignty to save the euro if push came to shove, that monetary union would force the pace towards joint EU government. So it proves to be, for now. But let us not forget that Europe's ideologues have achieved this only by pushing the world to the brink of catastrophe and holding parliaments to ransom with their great gamble, just as the West's financial elites held parliaments to ransom in the banking crash of October 2008. Once yields on 10-year...

• Private lenders to contribute €37bn to second Greek bail-out • Deal paves way for European monetary Fund and economic integration • Debt interest rates cut for Greece, Ireland and Portugal • Equity and debt markets rise on back of historic deal • 'We now have a programme and a package of decisions which create a sustainable path for Greece’ - Greek prime minister George Papandreou Greece is set to lead the eurozone's first-ever default as European leaders agreed that the private holders of Greek debt will take a hit of €50bn over three years. Breaking weeks of deadlock, the...