World IN BRIEF : SLOVAKIA : Ex-Banker Elected First President
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From Times Staff and Wire Reports
Parliament elected Michal Kovac, a former banker, as Slovakia’s first president, breaking a deadlock that had threatened to destabilize the newly independent country. Kovac, 62, was the last Speaker of Czechoslovakia’s federal Parliament before the country split peacefully into Czech and Slovak states on Jan. 1. Parliament had failed in two tries last month to choose a head of state when none of four candidates won the necessary three-fifths majority.
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