Italian officials have confirmed meetings between government ministers and officials of China's investment arm early this month but denied that bond purchase was the agenda of the talks.

Finance Minister Giulio Tremonti, Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti, Infrastructure Minister Altero Matteoli and other ministers held meetings with representatives of the China Investment Corporation (CIC) led by its head Lu Jiwei in Rome the past few weeks but the talks did not focus on bonds, ANSA quoted Italian officials as saying.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu on Tuesday answered reporters' question if China is buying Italian debts. He only said that Europe will continue be China's investment destination.

"We will also expand financial and economic cooperation and investment cooperation with European countries to jointly address the financial crisis," Shanghai Daily quoted Yu as saying.

Italy, Europe's third-largest economy, is seeking buyers for its bond to avoid a debt crisis similar to that which engulfed Spain, Greece and Portugal.

The EU member countries have turned to Chinese investors to buy sovereign debts since the U.S. mortgage crisis in 2007.
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government had dangled a 54 billion euro austerity package to the European Central Bank in a bid to convince the latter to buy its debt. Italy's debt currently stands at 1.9 trillion euros.