President Barack Obama has chosen Senator John Kerry to succeed Hillary Clinton as U.S. secretary of state.
The defeated 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, Kerry is currently head of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations committee.
On Thursday, Obama's ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, withdrew her name from consideration for the secretary of state post, effectively elevating Kerry to the prohibitive favorite.
Rice had come under fire over controversial statements about the deadly September 11 attack on a US mission in Libya, and some Republican lawmakers had vowed to block her path to becoming top diplomat.