France, Greece hold elections

Socialist candidate Francois Hollande beat defeated incumbent president Nicolas Sarkozy with just over 50 percent of Sunday's runoff vote in France. The new president is expected to be sworn in on May 15.

Meanwhile, ,bailout-reliant Greece faces days, possibly weeks, of political instability after voters angry at crippling income cuts punished mainstream politicians, let a far-right extremist group into Parliament but gave no party enough votes to govern alone. The leader of the centre-right New Democracy, Antonis Samaras, who backs Greece's bailout commitments for austerity, will launch coalition-forming talks later in the day.