Dublin - Ireland has seen 1,500 pubs close since 2001, two groups representing pub owners told national broadcaster RTE Thursday.

Dublin - The Irish Association of Pension Funds has warned that some private pension funds would collapse during the current financial crisis unless action was taken to shore them up, national broadcaster RTE reported Thursday.

The association had sent proposals to the government on how to deal with the problem, association chairman Patrick Burke said at the start of its annual conference in Dublin.

One proposal was to allow people about to retire to put off buying annuities as costs had increased owing to the credit crisis. You purchase an annuity when you hand over a lump sum in return for a stream of income over a defined period until your death.

Dublin - Irish President Mary McAleese eas due to sign into law Thursday afternoon a bill that would guarantee all deposits and borrowings for the six Irish-owned banks for the next two years, national broadcaster RTE reported.

Under the plans, the six banks - Allied Irish Bank, the Bank of Ireland, the Anglo Irish Bank, Irish Life & Permanent, the Irish Nationwide Building Society and the Educational Building Society - are to be provided a 400-billion-euro (560-billion-dollar) guarantee.

Dublin - Networking website Facebook plans to set up its international headquarters in the Irish capital Dublin, Deputy Prime Minister Mary Coughlan said in a statement Thursday.

The Dublin headquarters was expected to offer technical and sales support to users and customers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the statement said, without giving details of the amount to be invested.

Some 70 positions were expected to be created in Dublin, a spokeswoman for the Irish Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment.

Dublin - Ireland's Central Bank said Tuesday that mortgage- lending had reached its lowest level in 21 years in August.

Lending for residential mortgages was up just 9 per cent compared to August 2007, which is the lowest growth rate since
1987.

The increase in August was less than half the increase in July, according to the Central Bank, which described the figure as "exceptionally low."

The Irish government has donated more than 1.5 million dollars to Irish immigration organizations in the United States, a statement from Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said Sunday.

The total of 1,518,500 dollars would go to 16 organizations "which provide frontline support and advisory services to Irish emigrants."

Dublin has so far provided over 3.1 million dollars to immigration groups this year as up to an estimated 50,000 Irish citizens living and working in the US face possible deportation for not having visas.

Dublin has been pressuring Washington to grant the so-called undocumented Irish legal status.