Nicola Sturgeon has been re-elected as First Minister of Scotland in a vote at the Scottish Parliament.
The SNP leader asked MSPs to select her as the nominee for the post this afternoon after her party won 63 of 129 seats in the election on May 5.
The First Minister will now formally be appointed by the Queen.
Ms Sturgeon has said she will lead a minority Scottish Government after the SNP fell two seats short of securing an overall majority.
She became Scotland’s first female first minister in 2014, succeeding Alex Salmond who stood down following the No vote in that year’s Scottish independence referendum.
One of Ms Sturgeon’s first tasks will be to announce her new cabinet, ministers and law officers.
She has already signalled her intention to create a new dedicated cabinet post with responsibility for the economy.
The move will separate some of the responsibilities previously covered by the finance brief, seen as necessary with the new tax and welfare powers coming to the Scottish Parliament.
As well as a third successive term for the SNP, the election resulted in the Scottish Conservatives overtaking Labour to become the second largest party at Holyrood with 31 and 24 seats respectively.
The Greens increased their presence from two to six seats, overtaking the Liberal Democrats who remain on five.
Newly-elected MSPs were sworn in at the beginning of the fifth session of the Scottish Parliament last week, with Labour’s Ken Macintosh elected as the new presiding officer.
