Jordan's King swears in new technocrat-led government

AMMAN - Jordan's King Abdullah swore in a reformist government on Wednesday tasked with accelerating IMF-backed reforms and pushing through political and economic modernisation plans, officials said.

The Harvard-educated premier, Jafar Hassan, headed the monarch's office in his last posting. 

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.