Spain's official jobless number tops 5M

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MADRID, March 4 (UPI) -- Spain, with an unemployment rate hovering above 26 percent, had another increase in its number of jobless people in February, the Labor Department said.

Officials reported more than 5 million people out of work, an increase of 59,144, or 1.2 percent, from the previous month, Britain's Guardian reported.

The official number of unemployed does not count 1 million people who who have stopped looking for work, the report said.

Eurostat, the European Union's statistical office, said Friday Spain's unemployment rate for December was 26.2 percent, the second highest, behind Greece, in the 17-member eurozone.

Greece's jobless rate was posted as 27 percent although its figures were from November, not December.

The lowest unemployment rate tracked by Eurostat was 4.9 percent in Austria, which was followed by Germany and Luxembourg, both at 5.3 percent, Eurostat said.