UK premier to resign after Brexit vote

LONDON (AA) - U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron resigned Friday after losing a referendum on his country’s European Union membership.

Cameron said his country needed “strong leadership” to conduct exit negotiations with the EU and that he would leave office by the time of his Conservative Party’s conference in October.

The Conservatives would elect a successor in the meantime, he said.

In a statement delivered outside his official London residence of 10 Downing Street, with his wife Samantha standing by his side, Cameron said it would be for his successor to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty - the mechanism for leaving the EU.

Almost fifty-two percent of British voters rejected their country's 43-year membership of the EU in Thursday's referendum.