Finland forms entirely woman-led government

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By VT

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Finland has made history by forming the world's first entirely woman-led government.

The historic formation was officially announced on Sunday when five female-led parties came together to form a coalition. This happened after the country's female transport minister, Sanna Marin, was elected to become Prime Minister.

The youngest prime minister in the world.
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The 34-year-old will be replacing Antti Rinne as leader of the Social Democrats.

The center-left coalition is now entirely led by women - four of whom are under 35. Marin's role is particularly notable, as she has become the world's youngest Prime Minister and the third female leader of Finland, Helsingin Sanomat reports.

The formation of the coalition was celebrated by former Prime Minister Alexander Stubb, who said it "shows that Finland is a modern and progressive country."

Finish politicans.
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Marin has been an MP since 2015, and will officially take up her new position as prime minister next week. Rinne left the role citing a lack of trust after losing the support of key coalition partner, the Centre Party.

Rinne became the country's first left-wing leader in 20 years when he was elected in April. But his rule came unstuck when he was criticized by the main coalition party over a two-week postal strike in November, which spread to other industries including airline Finnair.

When Rinne stepped down, the coalition of Social Democrats, the Centre Party and three junior partners: the Greens, the Left Alliance and the Swedish People’s Party of Finland all resigned.

"My party is not in government," he later tweeted, "But I rejoice that the leaders of the five parties in government are female."

The new government, which consists of the Social Democrats and the four other coalition parties, will have a strong majority of 117 in the 200-seat parliament.

Finnish MP, Tytti Tuppurainen, described Sanna Marin as "a brilliant new prime minister", tweeting: "She's eminently good."

The leaders of the coalition parties are Katri Kulmuni, Maria Ohisalo, Li Andersson and Anna-Maja Henriksson.