ROME (AP) — Italian Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni was summoned to the presidential palace on Sunday and appeared poised to receive a mandate to try to form a new government.

President Sergio Mattarella said Saturday night he wants a new government to rapidly be in place, after Matteo Renzi resigned last week following a stinging defeat on a reforms referendum.

Gentiloni, a Democrat like Renzi, had emerged as a likely pick for Mattarella after the president held three days of consultations with political and parliamentary leaders.

While serving as foreign minister in Renzi's nearly three-year-old center-left coalition, Gentiloni lobbied for an international support to help end years of violence and fighting in Libya. The North Africa nation's lawless coast has turned into a vast launching pad for smugglers to send hundreds of thousands of migrants in unseaworthy boats toward Italian shores.

Gentiloni also spearheaded Italy's demands that the Egyptian government work to learn who tortured and killed a young Italian researcher in Cairo this year.

Mattarella has reminded political leaders that Italy faces several urgent problems. Among them is a possible government bailout for the Italian bank Monti dei Paschi di Siena, which direly needs to raise new capital. Another is the reconstruction of several Italian towns destroyed by a series of earthquakes in recent months.

The Italian populist opposition party, the 5-Star Movement, which is the Democrats' chief rival, has been pressing for a new election soon, to capitalize on the angry mood of voters who have punished ruling parties in much of Europe lately.

Mattarella said Saturday that the new government must make electoral reform an urgent priority so Italians could vote under smoother working rules.

It would be up to the Italian president to decide if or when to dissolve Parliament and call for elections ahead of their spring 2018 due date.