The announcement was made by the Education Secretary, David Blunkett, following a meeting in Dublin with Ireland's Minister for Education and Science, Micheal Martin.

Mr Martin had made representations on behalf of the Irish community in Britain.

Secondary school pupils are required to study at least one modern foreign language under the National Curriculum.

At present, they are allowed to choose from eight European Union languages and 11 non-European Union languages.

The European Union langages are French, German, Spanish, Italian, Danish, Dutch, modern Greek and Portuguese.

The non-EU languages are: Bengali, Gujerati, Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, Arabic, Japanese, Mandarin or Cantonese Chinese, Russian, modern Hebrew and Turkish.

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Mr Blunkett said: "At our meeting in December, Micheal Martin described the cultural importance of the Irish language to the Irish community in Britain."

"I listened to his arguments and, having considered them carefully, I have now decided that Irish should be added to the list of modern languages recognised as part of the English National Curriculum.

"I have asked my officials to make the necessary arrangements."

Mr Blunkett and Mr Martin also announced initiatives to promote links between schools in the UK and Ireland, including pupil and teacher exchanges.

They also agreed, in principle, to link the National Grid for Learning, a programme to wire every UK school to the Internet, with Ireland's Scoilnet.