WASHINGTON, Feb. 21 (Xinhuanet) -- Harvard University President Lawrence Summers announced Tuesday that he will resign as head of the prestigious U.S. university in June, ascribing the decision to conflicts with faculty which had made it hard to fulfill his duties.

    Summers, a former U.S. Treasury secretary under president Bill Clinton, announced his resignation in a letter posted on his web site. The move came a week before the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard's undergraduate professors, were due to hold a second vote of confidence in his leadership.

Harvard University President Lawrence Summers exits his office to address the media and student supporters in Harvard Yard in Cambridge, Massachusetts Feb. 21. (Reuters)

    "I have reluctantly concluded that the rifts between me and segments of the Arts and Sciences faculty make it infeasible for me to advance the agenda of renewal that I see as crucial to Harvard's future. I believe, therefore, that it is best for the University to have new leadership," the letter said.

    In a separate statement, Harvard said former Harvard president Derek Bok, who led Harvard from 1971 to 1991, would take over as interim president from July 1.

    The resignation of Summers came amid an increasingly intensified stand-off between him and Harvard faculty members who have been angered by his comments.

    Last year, Summers suggested that innate differences between the sexes might help explain why fewer women work in the academic sciences and math. In a symbolic move to protest the comments, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences passed a no confidence vote last March.

    Following the resignation of Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean William Kirby, the conflict between the president and the faculty culminated as another no confidence vote was scheduled for Feb. 28.

    The presidency of Summers, who became Harvard's 27th president in 2001, will be the shortest since Cornelius Felton died after two years in office in 1862. Enditem