Jordan's King to appoint US-educated technocrat as PM

AMMAN, Sept 15 (Reuters): Jordan's King Abdullah was expected to appoint key palace aide Jafar Hassan as prime minister after the government resigned on Sunday, days after a parliamentary election that saw some gains for the Islamist opposition in the US-allied kingdom, officials familiar with the matter said.

Hassan, now head of King Abdullah's office and a former planning minister, is expected to replace Bisher Khasawneh, a veteran diplomat and former palace advisor who was appointed nearly four years ago, the officials told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Harvard-educated Hassan, a widely respected technocrat, will face the challenges of mitigating the impact of the Gaza war on the kingdom's economy, hard-hit by curbs to investment and a sharp drop in tourism.

The outgoing prime minister had sought to drive reforms pushed by King Abdullah to help reverse a decade of sluggish growth, hovering at around 2%, that was worsened by the pandemic and conflict in neighbouring Iraq and Syria.

The traditional conservative establishment had long been blamed for obstructing a modernisation drive advocated by the Western-leaning monarch, fearing liberal reforms would erode their grip on power.

Politicians say a key task ahead is accelerating IMF-guided reforms and reining in more than $50 billion in public debt in a country with high unemployment and whose stability is supported by billions of dollars of foreign aid from Western donors.