Abdul Latif Rashid is new president of Iraqi parliament

Lawmakers in Iraq have elected Kurdish politician Abdul Latif Rashid as the country’s new president, paving the way for the formation of a new government and ending a year of deadlock.

He replaces fellow Iraqi Kurd Barham Saleh as head of state after the two-round vote in parliament on Thursday, winning more than 160 votes against 99 for Saleh, an assembly official said.

Rashid, 78, is a British-educated engineer and was the Iraqi minister of water resources from 2003 to 2010. He has 15 days to invite a nominee from the largest



parliamentary bloc to form a government.

“The question now is whether or not the newly elected president would be able to assign a new prime minister to form the government, given the fact that this is so controversial and has been behind all the political upheaval sweeping the country,” Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud Abdelwahed, reporting from Baghdad, said.

At least 269 of the 329 legislators attended the voting session on Thursday afternoon, which came hours after nine rockets struck areas near Baghdad’s Green Zone, where the parliament is located.