ROME/ATHENS - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi lost his parliamentary majority on Tuesday after his reform-shy government's borrowing costs soared into the euro zone's danger zone with investors fearing a new, bigger Greece.
Berlusconi won a crunch parliamentary vote on budget policy because the center-left opposition abstained. But he secured only 308 votes in the 630-seat chamber of deputies, indicating he no longer had a majority.
"I ask you, Mr Prime Minister, with all my strength, to finally take account of the situation ... and resign," opposition Democratic Party leader Pier Luigi Bersani said.
