During his visit to the U.S. last week, Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheal Martin announced the allocation of $2.68 million in grants for Irish organizations throughout the U.S. The Emigrant Support Program, managed by the Department of Foreign Affairs, provides the grants.

We here at IrishCentral took on the painstaking job of staring at countless images of attractive Irish men and women to determine the 10 hottest. And now here they are: the Hottest 10 Out of Ireland – enjoy!

After 17 months behind bars in Texas, a former IRA prisoner who has lived in the U.S. for over 25 years is due to be deported to Ireland at the end of this week -- and is facing more jail time in Ireland if Northern Ireland politician Jeffrey Donaldson has anything to do with it.

You don’t need to cross the Atlantic to find great traditional Irish treats. In fact, the best place to look maybe the Pacific Coast! San Francisco, a heavily Irish populated area of California, has a wide selection of Irish bakeries, pubs and restaurants that bring a bit of Eire over here.

Hundreds of Irish fans have joined the crowds descending on the City of Angels to say farewell to the king of pop. Aer Lingus was said to have completely sold out all flights from Dublin to Los Angeles for today and yesterday as heartbroken fans made their way from Ireland to the West Coast. The special memorial service has been totally over subscribed with more than 1.6 million people registering for just 9,000 tickets.

With video: In news that may come as a shock to few, but not to anyone who has given the matter any serious thought, the Blarney Stone in County Cork has been named the world’s germiest tourist attraction.

Since their album came out in March, The Script has had their music played on VH1 and in a number of television soundtracks. That buzz has caught the ear of none other than Sir Paul McCartney, who has tapped them to support his return to the old Shea Stadium site on July 17 and 18.

Irish-American comedian Conan O’Brien will take over Jay Leno’s post as the new host of NBC’s “Tonight Show” this upcoming Monday, June 1. He’s got some big shoes to fill, but luckily, O’Brien’s Irish Catholic background has helped prepare him for any comedic role.

Callie Cooper of the Comerford School in the Seattle area was the adjudicators’ choice as “Most Promising Dancer” at the recent Pacific Northwest Irish Dance Championships Feis in Seattle, May 16-17.

A beautiful Spring weekend in Seattle brought almost 500 dancers from the Western US and Western Canada to the Pacific Northwest Irish Dance Championships Feis May 16-17.

High-stakes action reality show “The Phone,” from executive producer Justin Timberlake, premiered on MTV last night with an Irishman at the helm.

Three Irish tech firms have recently announced major new business deals in Silicon Valley

Irish Minister Mary Coughlan began a week-long trade mission to the West Coast of the U.S. on Monday

The job of the Irish dance teacher of the World Championships is not an easy one: They are there to console, to offer encouragement, to make sure that every last detail is absolutely perfect.

Amid the relentless stories of job losses in Ireland, a U.S. firms sets up operations in Cork

Award-winning Irish actress Elaine Cassidy is making her stateside TV debut

Think you have it in you to fill Spiderman’s red and blue spandex and sing a U2 song while you’re at it? If so, your time has come!

Peter Kenyon, chief executive of Chelsea FC, was in New York Tuesday to announce the inaugural World Football Challenge.

Pity Paul Muldoon. The great Irish poet had the ridiculous task of following Barack Obama to the microphone at the

If you walk around the hallowed grounds of Stanford University these days, you just might come across a few lads pucking a sliothar about. Seriously. And if you don't believe that, the first-ever U.S. intercollegiate hurling game took place in February when Stanford lost to Cal State by 3-09 to 3-10. I'm not joking!

We here at IrishCentral took on the painstaking job of staring at countless images of attractive Irish men and women to determine the 10 hottest. And now here they are: the Hottest 10 Out of Ireland – enjoy!

  Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Brian Cowen will use his forthcoming trip to New York and the White House to promote Irish trade and investment and to highlight the plight of the Irish undocumented living

SEPTEMBER is shaping up to be a busy month for Irish actor - and now a writer and director - Stuart Townsend and his Oscar winning girlfriend Charlize Theron. Townsend's film Battle in Seattle, his first as a writer/director, has been selected for inclusion in the prestigious Toronto Film Festival which kicks off after Labor Day. Theron, who has a starring part in the movie, will also walk the Canadian red carpet to promote her highly anticipated new film from Oscar winner Paul Haggis called In the Valley of Elah, based on the Iraq war and its many complications.

Want to get a big fill of Irish celebrities? Then head north to Toronto next month for the city's annual film fest which will be taken over by a host of Irish stars this year.

Where do we start? We told you recently that Irish actor/director Stuart Townsend will premiere his new film Battle in Seattle which stars his Oscar winning girlfriend Charlize Theron, but Stu will hardly be short of a few Irish friends to hang with.

Bono is planning to attend the fest as well, seeing as he's got a featured part in the film Across the Universe, directed and written by Julie Taymor, who Bono has teamed with to bring a musical version of Spiderman to Broadway.

FOR some time now Dublin actor Stuart Townsend has been best known as the partner of Oscar winning actress Charlize Theron, but not anymore. His film Battle in Seattle, which he wrote and directed, debuted last week at the Toronto Film Festival to good reviews, and a production company snapped up distribution rights for a cool $2 million. Townsend worked on the screenplay for several years, and his story about the five days of riots and violence that plagued

the 1999 World Trade Organization conference in Seattle attracted an all-star cast that included Theron, Woody Harrelson, Michelle Rodriguez and Andre Benjamin, one-half of the hugely successful hip-hop duo Outkast.

THEY'LL roll out the red carpet - or perhaps it will be green? - in Dublin next month without fear of picketing writers, so perhaps a few stars hungry for some paparazzi attention will jet over for the fifth annual Irish Film and Television Awards, set for Sunday, February 17 at the Gaiety Theatre.

Nominees were announced last week, and a host of Irish old-timers and new stars are up for honors. Leading the way is the teenage dynamo Saoirse Ronan, the Carlow native who's named as a rising star nominee (alongside the likes of author Cecelia Ahern, but surely she's already risen to great heights?), and best supporting actress nominee for her part in Atonement.

MEL Gibson, beware of The Passion of the Irish Jewish Community. The star, who launched a notorious drunken tirade against Jews while being hauled off to the slam for drunk driving a couple of summers ago in LA, is due in Dublin this weekend to accept the Outstanding Contribution to World Cinema Award at the Irish Film and Television Awards, but a rabbi in Ireland is furious that Mad Mel should be placed on such a pedestal. "We find it very puzzling.

IT was a case of VIP gridlock alert in Dublin last week, and celebrity watchers were the gleeful beneficiaries. A gaggle of stars - Mel, Daniel, Bo, Colin, Charlize to name a few - arrived in the Irish capital for a whole bunch of events that firmly established Dublin as a stop on the celeb map of cool places to be seen.

The photos speak for themselves, right? Many of the notables walked the red carpet at the Irish Film and Television Awards on Sunday night at the Gaiety Theatre, chief among them Mel Gibson, who picked up an award for outstanding contribution to world cinema.

Since their March 2005 debut, Ireland's Celtic Women have enjoyed the kind of success that other singing groups can only dream of. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to the Irish super-group's newest member Alex Sharpe about their dizzying success and their upcoming New York shows at Radio City Music Hall.

IN the music industry the phrase "multi-platinum seller" is sweet music to everyone's ears - it means you've just sold several million records.

Daniel O'Donnell has captivated a generation of Irish and American fans with his melodic voice and his homespun charm. This month he's touring the U.S.

CHARLIZE Theron and her Irish beau Stuart Townsend were at the Democratic Convention in Denver last week not for the sole purpose of cheering on Barack Obama, but rather to promote Stu's documentary Battle in Seattle which he made a couple of years back.

The film, about the 1999 riots at the World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle in 1999, is set for limited release on September 19. Charlize, one of the stars of the flick, was none too pleased prior to the screening, however, when a photog from TMZ.

Films about big political issues rarely find a big audience, but Battle in Seattle is different. Featuring powerful performances from Hollywood A-listers, it's a hard-hitting action movie that pulls you in on a personal level from its opening frame. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to Irish actor and director Stuart Townsend about his all-star cast (including his Oscar winning girlfriend Charlize Theron).

AER Lingus has hailed a new deal with American low-fares flier JetBlue as a major advance for passengers on both sides of the Atlantic.What they called an industry-first "strategic partnership" was announced last week and will begin operating on April 3.The deal will give Aer Lingus passengers 40 new target destinations in addition to the seven U.

After spending more than two decades being what he calls "brainwashed" by the Church of Scientology, Co. Cork native John Duignan believes that A list movie star and noted Scientologist Tom Cruise is the reason why Amazon U.K.

Over the past three years, Mick Lynch and Kevin May of pop/folk act the Guggenheim Grotto have touched U.S. and U.

According to the folklore around his excellent new "Book of Lightning" disc, chief Waterboy Mike Scott turned to his binder of some 150 unused songs to create this new release. Can you imagine if that treasure got nicked in the studio and sold on eBay? What would it fetch? Based on the phenomenal songwriting on display in this Book of Lightning, bidding on his songbook would be high indeed.

Book of Lightning opens with "The Crash of Angels Wings," a sultry rocker that struts out of the speakers.

As I've mentioned in past columns, Irish-American legends Solas are probably the most lauded of all Celtic bands out there today, and quite right too. Now in their second decade, and with an exciting new singer, Mairéad Phelan, the band has a scorching new album, "For Love and Laughter," and are in the midst of an ambitious tour of the U.S.