HANOI, Vietnam ��Vietnam has its first female president with the appointment of Vice President Nguyen Thi Ngoc Thinh after Tran Dai Quang died Friday.
Thinh will be the acting president until the National Assembly elects a new leader. Thinh has been vice president since April 2016.
Vietnam will observe a mourning period Wednesday and Thursday to honor Quang. Quang, who was 61, was one of the country's top four leaders, with the general secretary of the Communist Party, prime minister and head of the National Assembly.
A former minister of public security who supported forging closer ties with the U.S. and boosting the nation's private sector, Quang hosted U.S. President Donald Trump during his first state visit to the communist country last year.
Under Vietnam's constitution, the vice president becomes acting president if the president dies in office until the National Assembly chooses a permanent replacement. The assembly's second one-month session of the year opens Oct. 22.
