Somali president appoints new PM

0 Comments | AFP, November, 2007

MOGADISHU (AFP) — Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed on Thursday named a veteran law-enforcement and aid official as his new prime minister and tasked him with steering the insurgency-wracked nation back to stability.

Yusuf named Nur Hassan Hussein, 69, who has served as the Somali Red Crescent Society (SRCS) chief for nearly two decades, to replace Ali Mohamed Gedi, who was forced to resign on October 29 after a long-running power struggle with the president.

"I have seen that he is a man who can fill the position and has the ability to lead the government," Yusuf said in the southcentral town of Baidoa, where parliament is based.

"I hope he will soon set up his government," he added.

Hussein, who held numerous posts in the former regime of...