Barclays Bank last week appointed a receiver over assets of Marumba Properties, a Dublin company that was behind plans to revamp the Finglas Shopping Centre in north Dublin, The Post reported. Acting on foot of a 2007 charge registered against the company’s assets, the bank installed David Carson, an accountant with Deloitte, as receiver to the company. Marumba Properties was planning to develop Finglas Village, a proposed development that was to include 160 apartments and a retail development. However, construction work has yet to begin on the site.

Greek debt managers, bankers and economists voiced relief on Friday at moves by European Union leaders and the European Central Bank to rescue the country from the threat of a sovereign default, the Financial Times reported. The EU decision on a “last resort” financial package including assistance from the International Monetary Fund would help reduce Greece’s high borrowing costs – provided its fiscal consolidation effort stayed on track, they said.

A senior Chinese central bank official criticized the handling of the Greek debt crisis, highlighting global concern about the situation in Europe, The Wall Street Journal reported. Speaking at a conference in Hong Kong, Zhu Min, deputy governor of the People's Bank of China, also said China "should and could" import more goods to keep its trade surplus small. And he noted that the central bank's efforts to tighten monetary policy were having their intended effect, even without China having to raise interest rates.

One of Ireland's best-known architectural firms Murray Ó Laoire has gone into liquidation, with the loss of more than 120 jobs, The Irish Times reported. The company cited cumulative bad debts, the difficult market and problems in getting paid on time for the collapse of the business. Murray Ó Laoire has offices in Dublin, Limerick, Cork, Slovakia, Russia, Germany, Libya, Barbados and Abu Dhabi. The company employs 127 people, with the majority of its staff based in Ireland.

European Union leaders hold what is likely to be a tense and difficult summit on Thursday, divided over how to help heavily indebted Greece and struggling to maintain confidence in the euro, Reuters reported. Diplomatic efforts on the eve of the two-day summit failed to bridge differences over whether to offer a safety net to Greece, helping push the euro down to a 10-month low after Portugal suffered a debt down downgrade.

Britain operates one of the largest welfare states in Europe. And that, it seems, is just fine with many of the British, The New York Times reported. Despite the worst recession since World War II, many people here show little appetite for shrinking a system that eats up half the nation’s economic output, more than in Portugal, Greece or Spain — all of which are trying to push through painful cuts. Indeed, as Britain’s Labour government confronts a yawning budget deficit, public sector workers are mobilizing to head off any reductions in wages or jobs.

The number of people in employment fell by 8.1 per cent in 2009, according to new figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO), bringing the unemployment rate to 13.1 per cent for the last quarter of last year, The Irish Times reported. The latest quarterly national household survey shows there were 1,887,700 persons in employment during the fourth quarter, an annual decrease of 166,900. This compares with an annual decrease in employment of 8.8 per cent in the third quarter and 3.9 per cent in the year to the fourth quarter of 2008.

The Ljubljana District Court initiated receivership proceedings at casino operator Casino Ljubljana, appointing Bojan Klenovsek as the receiver, the Slovenian Press Agency STA reported. Creditors have until 24 June to register their claims against the company. Read more. (Subscription required.)

Euro-zone leaders on Tuesday were working on a deal that could secure German backing for a financial rescue plan for Greece in return for an agreement by other countries to let the International Monetary Fund play a substantial role, according to senior European officials, The Wall Street Journal reported. But Germany, which has been pushing for IMF involvement in any bailout, is demanding tough conditions: Chancellor Angela Merkel insists that aid could come only to prevent a Greek default.

German chancellor Angela Merkel’s hard-line stance on Greece has come under attack from a top European Central Bank policymaker, who warned that the cost of inaction could be far worse than offering temporary financial support, the Financial Times reported. The unusually-strong criticism by Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, an ECB executive board member, highlighted frustration in Frankfurt at Berlin’s intransigence, which is threatening a showdown among eurozone political leaders at their summit in Brussels starting on Thursday.