国际英语新闻：Bakhit appointed as Jordan's new prime minister

AMMAN, Feb. 1 (Xinhua) -- Jordan's King Abdullah II named Marouf Bakhit as the new prime minister on Tuesday after the resignation of Samir Rifai, the state-run Petra news agency reported.

Born in 1947, Bakhit joined the Jordanian Armed Forces in 1964 and retired in 1999 as a major general. He once served as the ambassador to Turkey and Israel, the head of National Security and the acting director of the king's office.

Bakhit served as Jordan's prime minister from 2005 to 2007.

Jordan's Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit attends a news conference after meeting Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki (unseen) in Baghdad in this August 15, 2006 file photo. King Abdullah of Jordan on February 1, 2011 replaced his Prime Minister Samir Rifai, after protests over food prices and poor living conditions, naming former premier Marouf Bakhit to head the government.

In the letter of appointment, Abdullah II urged the new government to take "swift and tangible steps to embark on genuine political reform process," to entrench democracy, and to push forward the comprehensive development process, stressing the importance of focusing on economic reforms.

The king said the desired objectives for economic reforms would not be realized without political reforms that increase the participation of Jordanians in the decision-making process.

Abdullah II urged Bakhit to come up with a mechanism for comprehensive national dialogue with all the classes in the society, as well as a new modern election law to help speed up the political process.

After weeks of protests by Jordanians calling on the government to step down, Rifai, who was named as the prime minister in 2009, submitted his resignation to the king earlier Tuesday.