Alexis Tsipras quits and calls early polls

Greece's Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has announced he is resigning and has called an early election.

Mr Tsipras had faced a rebellion within his ruling hard-left Syriza party over a new bailout deal which has been agreed with international creditors.

Greece received the first €13bn ($14.5bn) tranche on Thursday, allowing it to repay a debt to the European Central Bank and avoid a messy default.

But the austerity measures needed for the deal angered many in his party.

Mr Tsipras had to agree to further painful state sector cuts, including far-reaching pension reforms, in exchange for the bailout - and keeping Greece in the eurozone.

The overall bailout package is worth about €86bn over three years. The payment of the first tranche was made on Thursday after the bailout deal - Greece's third in five years - was approved by relevant European parliaments.

He will visit President Prokopis Pavlopoulos later in the evening to submit his resignation. Greece will then be run by a caretaker government.

Reacting to the news, Martin Selmayr, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker's chief-of-staff, tweeted that "swift elections in Greece can be a way to broaden support" for the bailout deal.

Some 43 of Syriza's 149 MPs had either opposed the bailout or abstained in last Friday's Greek parliamentary vote that approved the deal.

The rebellion meant Mr Tsipras, who was elected this January, had effectively lost his parliamentary majority.