Chakrabarti gets second term as EBRD President

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's Suma Chakrabarti won a second four-year term as head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the bank said on Wednesday.

Former UK civil servant Chakrabarti, 57, secured the extension by seeing off a challenge from Polish central bank governor and former Prime Minister Marek Belka in a shareholder vote at the EBRD's annual meeting in London.

In an interview ahead of the vote, Chakrabarti told Reuters that he would recommend halting the bank's recent rapid expansion and give more focus to green investments and co-operation with other development banks, such as the new Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

The EBRD was set up in 1991 to invest in the former Soviet economies of eastern Europe. It has grown considerably over the last 10 years and now spends around 9 billion euros ($10.30 billion) a year in 36 countries from Morocco to Mongolia.

($1 = 0.8741 euros)

(Reporting by Marc Jones; editing by Karin Strohecker)