Al-Ahram Weekly | Region

		Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 5 - 11 April 2001 Issue No.528
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875		Current issue \| Previous issue \| Site map

Yemen's cabinet reshuffle
YEMENI President Ali Abdullah Saleh fired his prime minister on Saturday and asked the deputy prime minister, Abdul-Qader Bajammal, to form a new government, the sixth since 1990.
The presidential statement announcing the decision gave no reason for Abdul-Karim Al-Iryani's ouster. Al-Iryani, who served nearly three years as prime minister, is also secretary-general of Saleh's General People's Congress and a close adviser to the president. He was widely criticised for his inability to accomplish important economic reforms launched in 1995 with help from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
The new prime minister, 54-year-old Bajammal, is also foreign minister. A leading figure in Saleh's ruling party, he previously served as oil and planning minister.
The cabinet shuffle comes less than two months after voters approved amendments to the 1990 constitution which extend the terms of the president and legislators and establish municipal councils.
Bajammal is expected to bring new faces to the cabinet, but will encounter the same problems that bedevilled his predecessor, including troublesome tribal leaders and a corrupt bureaucracy.
Massacres continue
FIVE families living in rundown hamlets scattered across the northern Algiers region have been massacred in the past week, causing fears that armed Islamist militants have adopted a new tactic in their war against the Algerian government.
All the victims -- nearly 40 -- have been killed in cold blood in their beds at night. Most have had their throats cut. The attacks have increased insecurity in shantytowns and poverty-racked suburbs, where large families huddling in small houses make easy targets for those wielding weapons.
Hard-line extremists of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), whose base is in the Chrea mountains near the town of Blida, 50km south of Algiers, have been blamed for the latest attacks, as well as for other massacres in the region.
Families in the shantytowns, which tend to be situated in isolated pockets on the outskirts of bigger towns, feel targeted and believe their only salvation is to flee. Others, however, have already fled from violence in other areas of the country and have nowhere else to run. "We cannot live under these conditions any more, when every day we ask which family will be next on the death list," said a man who escaped a massacre on Tuesday at Ouled Yaich, near Blida, in which 16 people from two families were killed.
A call for redeployment
SOME 300 Lebanese politicians and intellectuals have formed a new non-sectarian group calling for the redeployment of Syrian troops in Lebanon and greater balance in the relationship between the two countries. The National Gathering for Salvation and Change was formed on Monday after a two-day meeting over the weekend.
In its final communiqué, the group denounced the "policies adopted by the Syrian and Lebanese authorities, because they are responsible for the rise of anti-Syrian mood due to the imbalance in [Lebanese-Syrian] relations." It called for "a redeployment of the Syrian army troops in Lebanon to establish clear and unambiguous bilateral relations between the two countries."
The gathering mainly groups representatives of the people's movement led by maverick former MP Najah Wakim, the Lebanese Communist Party and the popular Nasserite organisation of MP Mustafa Saad.
Unemployment plague
THE NUMBER of unemployed in the Arab world has risen to nearly 14 million, out of a working Arab population estimated at 90 million people, according to Arab Labour Organisation (ALO) reports.
"The number of unemployed in the Arab world has been on the rise over recent years and last year reached 14 million, representing nearly 15 per cent of the total active Arab work force," ALO head Ibrahim Queidar said during a meeting of Arab labour ministers in Amman on Monday.
He blamed the increase on "the setback in performance by Arab economies and the weakness in investment opportunities in the Arab world." He also warned that "the problem of unemployment threatens social stability in Arab countries."
Compiled by Rasha Saad

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