PARIS — Officials from 35 nations failed to agree on a successor to Mohamed ElBaradei as head of the International Atomic Energy Agency in a second day of voting on Friday, the agency said, opening the field to new candidates.
The officials, grouped in the agency’s board of governors, deadlocked after the leading candidate, Yukiya Amano, a Japanese official who is his country’s ambassador to the organization, fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority required for election in the vote at the agency’s headquarters in Vienna.
Mr. Amano outpolled his South African counterpart, Abdul Samad Minty, in three rounds of voting on Thursday and an additional three rounds on Friday, but never obtained the necessary margin for victory. With 24 votes required, Mr. Amano took 23 “yes” votes in the initial Friday poll on his candidacy, and in a later round received 22 affirmative votes with one abstention. In the final round, Mr. Minty garnered 15 “yes” votes with one abstention.
Washington Post story - same topic:
VIENNA -- A low-key Japanese diplomat could become head of the International Atomic Energy Agency when the organization charged with blocking the spread of nuclear arms meets this week to replace chief Mohamed ElBaradei.
ElBaradei's successor will influence how the world meets the nuclear challenges posed by Iran, Syria or of extremists thought to be seeking the bomb. Nonproliferation is the IAEA's most high-profile task and the agency's director-general can determine the style and intensity of how the agency carries out its duties.
The change in leadership comes at a potentially pivotal time in U.S.-Iran relations: the new American administration has signaled it is ready for direct negotiations with Tehran over nuclear and other issues.
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