Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan said he would recommend to a cabinet meeting later today that the government should apply for a financial bailout programme from the EU and the IMF.
Ireland's cabinet was to hold the emergency meeting to finalise a four-year deficit crisis plan seen as key to winning the international bailout and easing fears about the future of the euro currency.
The meeting comes as Irish officials hold a fourth day of tense talks with the European Union, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on financial assistance worth tens of billions of euros.
Concerns are growing that the huge deficit racked up by the one-time "Celtic Tiger" as it tried to save its banks could have a knock-on effect on other weak economies like Portugal, echoing the Greek crisis earlier this year.
Greece was forced to take a 110-billion-euro (150-billion-dollar) rescue package from the EU.
"I will be proposing to my colleagues that we should formally apply for a programme," Lenihan told RTE state radio.
He did not specify the size of the bailout, but agreed it would run to tens of billions of euros.
"Certainly, it will not be a three-figure sum," he added.
Media reports suggested the bailout package was thought to be worth between 40 and 100 billion euros.
"Obviously, the government will have to look at the various considerations involved but as the responsible minister I believe it is important that this state continues to fund itself in a stable way," Lenihan said.
"That economic continuity is preserved. That there is no danger to the borrowing which the state requires to make in its own interest and also, and above all -- and the issue that has been highlighted this week -- that our banking sector is stabilised.
"So, for all these reasons I will be recommending to the government that we should apply to a programme and open formal negotiations."
Lenihan said market conditions had been very difficult since late August.
He said that since a visit to Dublin of EU Economic Commissioner Olli Rehn a fortnight ago "market conditions had impacted on the banking sector in particular".
"There was considerable concern both on our part and on the part of the Europeans about this issue."
A spokesman for the government of Prime Minister Brian Cowen said the Irish cabinet would meet "in the middle of the afternoon" to finalise its austerity measures, with reports saying an announcement was expected on Tuesday.
The new austerity drive is looking to save 15 billion euros up to 2014.
Dublin has pumped some 50 billion euros into the country's stricken banks, pushing its public deficit to 32 percent of output -- more than 10 times the EU limit.
Cowen said Saturday that the four-year plan was "very well advanced", adding that its outline had already won Rehn's approval.
Ahead of the cabinet meeting, Europe Minister Dick Roche told the BBC that mistakes had been made in Ireland, and that there had been "criminality" at the country's banks which "would have to be dealt with".
"There were bad mistakes made they weren't just made in this country, they were made elsewhere," he said.
"We have been through worse as a nation. We are a very resilient race and we will come out of this."
The international mission is subjecting Ireland's books to forensic analysis, with Cowen's government trying to deflect fears about a loss of sovereignty while defending a wafer-thin parliamentary majority.
Ireland was thought to be under pressure to compromise on its long-cherished 12.5-percent corporation tax rate, believed by Dublin to be key in attracting foreign investment.
However, "that issue is off the agenda now", Lenihan said.
In the past three years Ireland's public finances have been ravaged by the costly banking sector rescues, a property market meltdown and the global recession.
Herman Van Rompuy, the EU's president, has warned that the 27-nation bloc's very future could be at stake amid the Irish debt crisis.