Belgium’s Prime Minister Elio Di Rupo handed his government's resignation to King Philip on Monday following general elections at the weekend that saw his Socialist party suffer a narrow defeat to the Flemish separatist party N-VA.

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"The king accepted the resignation and asked the government to continue in a caretaker capacity," a statement from Di Rupo’s office said.

N-VA won 32 percent of Sunday's ballot, making it the largest party both in its Flanders heartland and the country as a whole. The Socialists garnered 30 percent of the vote.

King Philip will now begin consultations with political leaders to see who can form a new government, of necessity a coalition, in a country sharply divided into the Flemish-speaking north and the French south.

In 2010, N-VA leader Bart De Wever balked at cooperating with the Socialists, contributing to a stalemate which handed Belgium the world record for the number of days – 541 – it took to form a new government.

The political bickering over constitutional changes to give Flanders more autonomy unsettled European financial markets.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)



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