Wysterian Union Elects New Chancellor

VEREINSTADT (WRI) - Following a tightly fought election amidst enormous political tension, the Wysterian Union has a new chancellor.

Sen. Thomas Iselin, the leader of New Felix's 12-member delegation to the Wysterian Union, has been selected as chancellor of the 16-member nation body, along with his running mate, Sen. Antony Keseus of Daekarius, which has nine representatives in the WU senate.

Iselin and Keseus ran against Charles McVellen, leader of the 11-member Melcelenian delegation to the WU, and his running mate, Beauregard Prescott, leader of the two-member Infinitian delegation.

The hard-line Iselin defeated McVellen 54 to 34 in the Wysterian Senate.

With Iselin taking the top post of chancellor, Keseus assumes the role of High Minister of Foreign Policy.

The WU entered the race in the midst of a period of deep soul searching. Shaken by recent conflicts with the Indomitable Borderlands of the Grendels over that nation's request to join the WU's Partnership for Prosperity program - which the WU rejected - and by ever increasing conflict with ZaKommia - which recently erupted in full-blown war in Nephia - the organization has been operating in a state of controlled anxiety.

In his last state of the union message to the WU senate, former Chancellor Alexander Vondergaard warned members that, as a union of nations of a wide variety of cultures and economic abilities, the WU was no longer "a club of mid-sized, economically powerful states. We are heterogeneous, with several smaller, economically modest states. … This growth has cost us the luxury of consensus decision making for every issue that we encounter, and this has tested our democratic traditions and processes. But through these changes we have remained resilient and focused on a wider world-view that includes more nations like those that are in the Wysterian Union and less of those that look like nations like ZaKommia."

Iselin addressed those changes in his victory speech shortly after his election. "Throughout the past six months, the Wysterian Union has endured a series of events that were thought unimaginable when seven nations founded this union in July 2004. But, through these events, whether it be in Kosmania, Teneria, or the war in Nephia, we have stood stronger than any body in this great region."