Interpol – the International Criminal Police Organization – on Thursday appointed United Arab Emirates’ Major General Ahmed Nasser Al Raisi as its new president for a term of four years.

Al Raisi, who is also the inspector general at the UAE’s interior ministry, was up against the organization's vice president and Czech police colonel Sarka Havrankova in the election for the coveted slot, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.

The body that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and crime control announced the development in a tweet.

Al Raisi has more than four decades of law enforcement experience and is an expert in policing, digital transformation, forensics, and international anti-crime coordination, according to his official website.

More than 140 member nations had gathered in Turkey to elect the next president of Interpol, with each country getting one vote.

Al Raisi's candidacy was mired in controversy, particularly in Britain with six lawmakers writing to Prime Minsiter Boris Johnson with their objections, while calling for Britain to oppose his candidacy.

"As a UAE Government official, Major General al-Raisi is part of a state apparatus that systematically carries out grave human rights abuses, including the detention of human rights defenders and peaceful critics and the use of torture and ill-treatment in security facilities," the letter read.

He us also the subject of multiple lawsuits in UK, Sweden, Norway and France, reported British publicaiton The Guardian.

Al Raisi's appointment to the top post comes at a time when clouds of past and current controversies still hang over Interpol.

The last Interpol president elected to a four-year term, Meng Hongwei, is serving a prison term in China for corruption — charges that his wife says were manufactured by other senior Chinese officials to silence him.