Yemen's new government sworn in

Yemen's new government which will serve until April 2003 was sworn in yesterday and pledged to press on with economic reforms and maintain law and order. The 35-member cabinet headed by former foreign minister Abdul-Qader Bagammal said it would focus on security and stability in the small Arab state.

"Security, stability, civil peace and law and order are among the top missions of this governemnt," Bagammal said in a speech at the first meeting of the new government. The country of 17.5 million people has been plagued by lawlessness and frequent kidnappings.

Bagammal said his government would also work towards implementing financial and administrative decentralisation. President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who headed the cabinet's first meeting, called on Bagammal and his ministers to remain committed to economic reforms prescribed by the World Bank in the early 1990s.

As in the outgoing government, all ministers in the new cabinet belong to President Saleh's General People's Congress (GPC). Bagammal introduced 23 new faces to the government including Wahiba Fare, the first woman minister in Yemen.