Turkey unemployment hits record high of 16.1 pct
Turkey's unemployment rate jumped to a record high of 16.1 percent in the January-March period, due to a sharp contraction in the economy, the Turkish Statistics Institute said on Friday.The unemployment rate, measured on a three-month moving average, stood at 15.5 percent from December to February and 11.9 percent in the January-March period a year earlier. Analysts are forecasting that Turkey's economic slump probably deepened in the first quarter of 2009, with the slow-down in GDP likely reaching double figures. The global economic crisis has hit Turkey hard and the International Monetary Fund expects the country's economy to shrink 5.1 percent this year.
