The Romanian prime minister and his cabinet have resigned after weeks of sometimes violent protests over widespread corruption and austerity measures.

Emil Boc said on Monday he was quitting "to release the tension in the country's political and social situation".

During his three-year rule, salaries of state employees were cut by a quarter and VAT (value added tax) increased by five percentage points, while the European debt crisis hit Romania's exports hard.

It was a toxic combination in a country that was already the second poorest in the E.U., better off only than Bulgaria, which also joined the union in 2007.

The collapse of Boc's cabinet marks the fall of yet another E.U. government since the euro crisis started to bite. Since 2009, governments in Slovakia, Slovenia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Ireland and the Czech Republic have imploded before scheduled elections, with economic woes playing a significant role in each demise. Voters in Hungary, Spain and Portugal also signaled their unhappiness with the fiscal policies of their governments, plumping for new leaders at the ballot box.