Gentiloni replaces Mogherini

(ANSA) - Rome, October 31 - Paolo Gentiloni was sworn in Friday as Italy's new foreign minister.
    He replaces Federica Mogherini, who quit the post Friday as she is poised to become the European Union's new high representative for foreign affairs and security policy on Saturday. Gentiloni and Mogherini are both senior members of Premier Matteo Renzi's centre-left Democratic Party (PD). "I thank President Giorgio Napolitano and Premier Matteo Renzi," the new minister said. "I know this is a great responsibility. We will work in continuity with Federica Mogherini".
    The 59-year-old former communications minister will likely address the Senate for the first time in his new guise as foreign minister on November 6, sources said. A native of Rome and a journalist by trade, Gentiloni in his youth joined the Party of Proletarian Unity (PDUP), which combined extreme left, socialist and Catholic elements. He later grew into more moderate views, becoming a founding member of centre-left party La Margherita (The Daisy) in 2002. The Daisy eventually merged into what would become the now-ruling PD, with Gentiloni as one of the 45 members of its national founding committee in 2007.
    The former editor of The New Ecology, the monthly magazine of leading environmentalist organization Legambiente, Gentiloni became a Rome city councilor and then spokesman to newly-elected Mayor Francesco Rutelli in 1993. In 2001, when Rutelli finished his second term in office, he was elected to the Lower House of parliament and became chairman of the Broadcasting Services Watchdog Committee in 2005. Re-elected as an MP in 2006, he became communications minister during the center-left government of Romano Prodi. Within the PD, he was among the first of the old guard to side with Renzi. He ran in the 2012 PD primaries for Rome mayor, which were won by current Mayor Ignazio Marino