Al Bashir appoints new cabinet

Khartoum:  Sudan unveiled a new cabinet on Wednesday to include more opposition parties but kept major portfolios under the control of President Omar Al Bashir's ruling National Congress Party (NCP).

Al Bashir has been trying to form a broadly-based new cabinet to strengthen his power base since South Sudan became independent in July as part of a 2005 peace deal ending decades of civil war.

Analysts had been expecting fresh faces as the ruling NCP is under pressure to overcome an economic crisis which worsened when the South took away about three-quarters of the country's oil production, the main source of state revenues.

But in the new cabinet, the same NCP ministers will maintain top portfolios including finance, oil, foreign affairs, defence and the interior, presidential assistant Nafie Ali Nafie told reporters.

Foreign minister Ali Karti, defence minister Abdul Rahim Mohammad Hussain and Finance Minister Ali Mahmoud will stay in office, among other key officials.

Fourteen other parties were given posts, with the only major newcomer being the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

The current industry minister, Awad Al Jaz, will become oil minister, a position he held in the 1990s.