Annual inflation rose to 1.5 per cent in April across the 16 countries that share the euro currency, up from 1.4 per cent in March, official figures showed yesterday, while the unemployment rate in the eurozone remained at a record high 10 per cent in March.

The flash estimate produced by the EU's Eurostat data agency showed the inflation rate in the common currency area at its highest since December 2008.

Eurozone inflation has risen, almost continuously, since standing at 0.5 per cent last November as the bloc emerges from the worst recession since the 1930s.

The latest increase moves the figures closer to the European Central Bank's core economic target of inflation at close to but below two per cent.

The 10 per cent unemployment rate in March also showed over 100,000 more people joining the jobless.

The jobless rate for the common currency area was unchanged from February, running at the highest since the euro came into being in 1999 and with almost 1.4 million more people out of work than 12 months earlier, Eurostat said.

The figures revealed huge divergences, showing Spain, the latest eurozone country to come under pressure in the fallout from the Greek debt crisis, with a jobless rate of 19.1 per cent, higher than anywhere save Latvia, on 22.3 per cent.