Luxembourg:  EU foreign ministers, sifting through the wreckage of the bloc's Lisbon Treaty, admitted today there were no quick fixes after its rejection by Irish voters plunged the bloc into crisis.

With no easy solution in sight, the ministers agreed to give Dublin time to mull over what to do next after the "No" verdict delivered by a referendum on Thursday.

"No one is rushing to judgment, no one believes ...that somehow there is a quick fix," British Foreign Secretary David Miliband told journalists on the sidelines of the meeting in Luxembourg.

The Irish referendum result pushed the European Union into one of its periodic crises over reforming its institutions because the text has to be ratified by all 27 member states.

Although all eyes were fixed on Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin, ministers were careful not to isolate Ireland any more than it already has been.

"There was no sense of any threatening Ireland or any attempt to... Marginalise any member state," Martin told journalists.

"There was a sense that Europe has had significant setbacks in the past but working together has had the capacity overcome those setbacks."

Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen would attend an EU summit in Brussels on Thursday and give European leaders "an assessment of the treaty and its implications," he added.

Few politicians in Luxembourg however are expecting a magic-bullet solution from the Irish leader, who has only been in power a matter of weeks.

Source : PTI