Luxembourg - Unemployment in the eurozone dropped to 8.1 per cent in August, the lowest rate since November 2008.

Across the 19-country currency bloc, 13.2 million people were without a job in August, according to the data from the European Union's statistics agency Eurostat. The figure represents a fall of 0.1 percentage point from July.

Youth unemployment remained at 16.6 per cent in August, plateauing after several months of decline.

The countries with the lowest overall jobless rate were the Czech Republic at 2.5 per cent, followed by Germany and Poland at 3.4 per cent.

Unemployment was the highest in Greece - at 19.1 per cent in June, the latest data available - and Spain, at 15.2 per cent.

In the 28-country EU, the unemployment rate remained unchanged in August at 6.8 per cent.