Italian carmaker Fiat SpA's (FIATY) plan for a merger with General Motors Corp.'s (GM) European operations presented to the German government doesn't include the closure of 10 plants throughout Europe and the loss of 18,000 jobs, a German economics ministry spokesman said Wednesday.

He rejected the report of such a plan in German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, or FAZ, which had cited an internal Fiat document.

"The model which has been reported...is from the beginning of April and is therefore no longer up to date or at least not the model which has been part of the last talks," ministry spokesman Steffen Moritz told reporters.

Fiat Chief Executive Sergio Marchionne met with German government officials Monday to outline the company's plan for a merger of Fiat with German car maker Adam Opel GmbH and GM Europe.

FAZ had also reported that most of the planned jobs cuts would take place in Italy and England.

Moritz said that no new talks have been conducted since with Austrian-Canadian auto parts maker Magna International Inc. (MGA), which had presented a rough plan for General Motors Corp.'s (GM) European unit Adam Opel GmbH last week.

Web site: www.bmwi.de

-By Andrea Thomas, Dow Jones Newswires; 49-30-288-8410; andrea.thomas@dowjones.com