Eurozone unemployment hits new record of 11.9%

Unemployment in the eurozone reached a new high of 11.9 percent in January, as an additional 201,000 people joined the jobless ranks in the crisis-battered bloc, latest data showed Friday. The unemployment rate has been increasing relentlessly since the middle of 2011, dpa reported. The European Union's statistics agency, Eurostat, also revised the December rate, from 11.7 to 11.8 percent. Many analysts believe that unemployment will rise further still because of the eurozone's enduring debt crisis. The EU's executive, the European Commission, also predicted last week that it would climb above 12 per cent this year. Just under 19 million people were jobless in the 17-member eurozone in January, 1.9 million more than a year earlier. They included 3.6 million people under the age of 25, leading to a youth unemployment rate of 24.2 percent. Greece and Spain continued to post the worst figures, with overall unemployment above 26 per cent and youth unemployment approaching 60 per cent in Greece and remaining above 55 per cent in Spain. Germany, Austria and the Netherlands continued to post the lowest rates. In the wider 27-member EU, the overall rate increased to 10.8 percent in January, after another 222,000 people became unemployed. A total of 26.2 million people are without a job in the bloc.