GREEK DEPUTY LABOUR MINISTER RESIGNS

Greece's deputy labour minister resigned on Monday saying the government was not being aggressive enough in pushing for changes to an unpopular bailout, becoming the third cabinet member to quit the fledgling coalition in as many weeks.

The resignation is a new setback for Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, whose government had already stumbled to a rocky start when his initial pick for finance minister resigned over health problems.

"The sole reason for my resignation is my personal conviction that the issue of renegotiating with the troika, as well as the correction of significant distortions in labour, pension, social security and welfare issues, should have been emphatically put on the table from the start," Nikos Nikolopoulos wrote in his resignation letter.

Reuters