AMMAN, Oct 25: Jordan’s King Abdullah swore in a new government on Saturday, replacing a prime minister with business ties to prewar Iraq with a close aide charged with speeding up modernisation of the tribal kingdom.

New Prime Minister Faisal al-Fayez, a close palace aide from the influential Bani Sakhr tribe, was appointed by the king on Wednesday to replace Ali Abu al-Ragheb, who resigned amid charges of corruption and nepotism after three years in the job.

“This will be a homogeneous government team and committed to your vision of a work plan and specific results,” Fayez told the monarch in a message relayed on state television.

The cabinet line-up is likely to play well in Washington, which has shored up the kingdom, a close Arab ally in its campaign in Iraq.

The new government is likely to continue Jordan’s IMF-guided free market reforms and traditional support for US policies in the region, officials have said.

Downsized by one third to 20 ministers, the cabinet includes three women ministers and is dominated by Western-leaning pro-reformists as opposed to the conservative politicians who held sway in previous governments.

For the last two days the cabinet has held brainstorming sessions in the Red Sea port of Aqaba, a palace official told Reuters.

The new cabinet make-up will help win public support among a restive population angry about a curtailing of freedoms which the former government had justified on security grounds.—Reuters