Italy elects senior judge Sergio Mattarella as president

Italian legislators elected Sergio Mattarella, a constitutional court judge and veteran center-left politician, as president on Saturday, handing a welcome political victory to Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.

“My first thoughts are of the difficulties and hopes of our citizens,” Mattarella said.

He later visited the site in Rome where German troops killed 335 Italians in World War Two, saying that Europe must unite to battle terrorism the same way allied nations banded together to defeat "Nazi hate, racism, anti-Semitism, and totalitarianism".

The election shows the 40-year-old Renzi in firm control of both his fractious party and his allies in the ruling majority as he seeks to pass reforms aimed at underpinning an economic recovery in Italy, where unemployment is soaring after six years of on-off recession.

After three inconclusive rounds of voting this week in which a two-thirds majority was needed, his candidate Mattarella was elected in the fourth round, when the required quorum fell to a simple majority.

As the ballots were counted out loud in the Chamber of Deputies, the 1,009 parliamentarians and regional officials eligible to vote burst into applause when Mattarella's name surpassed the 505-vote threshold, making him Italy's 12th president since World War Two.

Mattarella, 73, who is little known to most Italians, got 665 votes. He will be sworn in on Tuesday at 10 a.m. (0400 ET) for a seven-year term, taking over from 89-year-old Giorgio Napolitano, who resigned earlier this month.