Sarkozy appoints new Ministers

PanARMENIAN.Net - French President Nicolas Sarkozy shuffled his Cabinet's top diplomatic and security posts Feb 27, jettisoning his foreign minister who has been roundly criticized for her ties to Tunisia's ousted regime.

Sarkozy's address focused on foreign affairs and sought to counter critics who have faulted his conservative government's response to upheaval across the Arab world - including several former French colonies in North Africa.

Sarkozy made no reference to Foreign Minister Michele Alliot-Marie, who hours earlier sent him her resignation, but simply said that Defense Minister Alain Juppe will now become France's top diplomat.

In place of Juppe, the president said former minister Gerard Longuet, who heads Sarkozy's conservative party in the Senate, will take up the defense portfolio. Claude Gueant, formerly Sarkozy's chief of staff, was named interior minister in place of Brice Hortefeux — long one of Sarkozy's top lieutenants and political allies.

The shake-up comes only three months after Sarkozy last altered the Cabinet. At the time, he said he expected that shuffle to be his last before the 2012 presidential election, "barring the unforeseen."

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon also faced criticism over his Christmas family holiday in Egypt, which funded by the regime of ousted President Hosni Mubarak. Fillon has since required ministers to get government approval before taking vacations outside the European Union, a move aimed at curbing their longtime practice of accepting junkets from foreign governments. Fillion kept his job, AP reported.