Ireland is expected to issue a new 10-year benchmark bond this week to raise up to 3 billion euros ($3.89 billion), the Sunday Business Post reported, without quoting any sources.

Ireland's debt agency has already said it plans to launch the new benchmark issue ahead of resuming regular bond auctions later this year. Finance Minister Michael Noonan said Dublin would look to raise the debt in the first half of the year.

The country has gradually begun to return to financial markets to raise money from investors, paving the way for an exit from its European Union/International Monetary Fund bailout later this year.

The National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) is believed to be in advanced stages of planning the deal, the Business Post reported, adding that barring a market upset early this week, it would look to raise between 2.5 billion and 3 billion euros.

A spokesman for the NTMA declined to comment.

Ireland, which became the first bailed-out country to return to long-term bond markets last year, raised over a quarter of its long-term target for this year in January when it sold 2.5 billion euros of five-year debt.

Irish bond yields have fallen over the past 18 months and are trading below the equivalent levels of Spanish and Italian government bonds, two fellow euro zone strugglers which have avoided sovereign bailouts.

Yields on Ireland's current benchmark 2020 bond fell to 3.68 percent this week after European Union finance ministers agreed to look at how to extend the maturity of emergency loans Ireland and Portugal have received under their bailouts. In July 2011, the yield on the 2020 benchmark bond had been more than 15 percent.

($1 = 0.7703 euros)

(Reporting by Padraic Halpin. Editing by Jane Merriman)