Jordan's King Abdullah swears in new government led by technocrat

Jordan's King Abdullah swore in a reformist government on Wednesday tasked with accelerating IMF-backed reforms and pushing through political and economic modernisation plans, officials said.

The Harvard-educated prime minister, Jafar Hassan, headed the monarch's office in his last job. Hasan has proven to be an able administrator during a long public career in which he oversaw economic reforms as a deputy premier and during a stint as planning minister, according to officials and politicians.

Politicians say a key task is accelerating IMF-guided reforms and reining in more than $50 billion in public debt in a country with high unemployment and whose stability is supported by billions of dollars of foreign aid from Western donors.

The traditional conservative establishment had long been blamed for obstructing a modernisation drive advocated by the Western-leaning monarch, fearing liberal reforms would erode their grip on power.

The new 32-member cabinet includes moderates, tribal politicians and technocrats. Jafar had canvassed the views of the powerful Islamist opposition which made significant gains in parliamentary elections earlier this month.

The Islamists won 31 seats, the most they have held since parliamentary life was revived in 1989 after decades of martial law, leaving them the largest political grouping in parliament.

Although the new composition of the 138-member parliament retains a pro-government majority, the more vocal Islamist-led opposition could challenge IMF-backed free-market reforms and foreign policy, diplomats and officials say.