A lawyer from Gambia, Fatou Bensouda, was named the new chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court on Monday, making her the future public face and chief strategist of the tribunal responsible for investigating the world’s grave atrocities.
She will be only the second person to hold the job when she takes over from Luis Moreno-Ocampo of Argentina, whose term of office expires in June. She is currently Mr. Moreno-Ocampo’s deputy at the court, which is based in The Hague. 
Ms. Bensouda, 50, was voted in by consensus at a meeting at the United Nations of the 120 countries that have recognized the jurisdiction of the first permanent criminal court. The decision came after a yearlong search that involved a list of more than 50 candidates, which was whittled down to 8, then to 4.
But from the start, Ms. Bensouda had the support of almost 70 countries, among them most of the court’s African members. After it became clear that Ms. Bensouda would be the only candidate who could produce a consensus, the last remaining contender, Tanzania’s chief justice, Mohamed Chande Othman, withdrew.
When Ms. Bensouda becomes the world’s most visible prosecutor for a single nine-year term, she may bring a change of style with her soft-spoken, low-key manner — a sharp contrast to her more publicity-conscious boss, who succeeded in quickly thrusting the new institution into the limelight after it opened its doors in 2002.
But having served as deputy prosecutor since 2004, Ms. Bensouda is expected to bring continuity rather than sharp changes to her powerful office, at least in the near future. A large docket of cases awaits, involving war crimes or crimes against humanity, and in the case of Sudan, charges of genocide. Only one trial has been concluded. Two others are going on.
Supporters of the court now hope that the presence of an African prosecutor could tone down some of the fierce criticism it has received from Africa, where many have labeled it a neocolonial tool in the hands of the West because all of the cases so far have come from African countries.
In four cases — involving the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Uganda and Ivory Coast — the governments themselves called in the court. Two cases, involving Sudan and Libya, were initiated on instructions from the United Nations Security Council. And only one case, involving six suspects linked to post-election violence in Kenya, was initiated by the prosecutor’s office.
But such details were overlooked in a campaign against the court that was begun several years ago by Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya and was joined more quietly by President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan, who is wanted by the court on charges that include genocide. Charges against Mr. Qaddafi, issued this year, were annulled recently after he was killed.
Being an African could bring different pressures to bear on Ms. Bensouda. Groups from Kenya continue to demand that investigations of their six citizens be conducted at home. And the African Union, which early on proclaimed Ms. Bensouda as its candidate, insists that its member countries ignore the court’s arrest warrant for Mr. Bashir. Some have called for the warrant to be dropped.
At a news conference after her election, Ms. Bensouda was asked how, as chief prosecutor, she would handle criticism from Africa. “My origin, being an African, has nothing to do with my mandate,” she said.
Ms. Bensouda served as a legal adviser and trial attorney at the international tribunal that prosecuted leaders of the 1994 Rwanda genocide. In Gambia, she has served as attorney general and minister of justice.
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