The New Nation - Internet Edition

Reuters, Brisbane

Incoming Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, a Mandarin-speaking former diplomat, has pledged closer Australian ties with overseas allies and unity at home after ending 11 years of conservative rule under John Howard.

Rudd, 50, presented himself as a new-generation leader by promising to pull about 500 frontline Australian troops out of Iraq and sign the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, further isolating Washington on both issues. "To our friends and allies around the world, I look forward as the next Prime Minister of Australia to working with them in dealing with the great challenges which our world now faces," he told cheering supporters at a victory party late on Saturday.

The surge to Labor left Howard battling to win even his own parliamentary seat, which he has held since 1974. He was in danger of becoming the first prime minister since 1929 to lose his constituency.