A political coalition has installed the leader of Iceland’s Left-Green party as prime minister, the fourth in two years for the north Atlantic island nation of 340,000.
Katrin Jakobsdottir, described by the New York Times as “a pacifist environmentalist and expert on Icelandic crime thrillers,” will take office after her party signed an agreement last week with the conservative Independence Party and centre-right Progressive Party. Together, the coalition holds 35 of 63 seats in Iceland’s parliament.
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According to the Times, opinion polls have found Jakobsdottir, a former education minister, to be “one of the most trusted and well-liked politicians in Iceland, a popularity that far outstrips that of her party.”
In addition to pledging to raise welfare benefits, Jakobsdottir campaigned on making Iceland carbon neutral by 2040, and “a willingness to have Iceland take in more refugees.”
The rocky volcanic island has been a (literal) hotbed of geothermal development, and recently inaugurated a novel plant to extract carbon dioxide and sequester it as stable rock deep underground.
