Monti to form next Italy cabinet

Technocrat Mario Monti has been told to form a new Italian government after resignation of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Saturday.

The appointment came after a day of meeting with top politicians held by President Giorgio Napolitano.

Mr Monti, an ex-EU commissioner, said he planed a return to growth for Italy and a return to pride for Italians.

He requires a working majority in parliament to implement an austerity plan. Most parties areagree his nomination.

Italy's borrowing costs has been increased, threatening the eurozone.

Mr Monti's candidature was announced after Mr Napolitano spent the day in 17 meetings with senior politicians.

Angelino Alfano, a senior figure in Mr Berlusconi's People of Freedom Party, said after meeting the president that the party was ready to back Mr Monti, but it would upto new government's make-up and policies.

No politician who "was engaged in pure anti-government militancy" while Mr Berlusconi was in power should join it, he said.

Speaking in a recorded TV address, Mr Berlusconi himself said he would redouble his efforts in parliament to modernise Italy.

Most centrists and centre-left parties in the opposition have already pledged their support, but Mr Berlusconi's main coalition ally, the Northern League, has made clear it wants early elections and will not back Mr Monti.

On Sunday, its leader Umberto Bossi reiterated his party would "not back technocrat PM Monti until we know his policies".

The new prime minister will be responsible for implementing austerity measures aimed at tackling Italy's debt crisis, which last week saw its cost of borrowing increase to record levels and prompted alarm across the eurozone.

Amid the crisis, Mr Berlusconi lost his parliamentary majority and promised to resign once measures required by the EU and designed to restore markets' confidence in the country's economy had been passed by both houses of parliament.

Members of the lower house voted 380-26 with two abstentions on Saturday, a day after the Senate agreed the measures that have now been signed into law.

Mr Berlusconi, who dominated the country's politics for 17 years and became Italy's longest-serving post-war prime minister, drove to the presidential palace on Saturday evening to tender his resignation.