DAMASCUS - President Bashar al-Assad will address Saturday the new Syrian government, which was unveiled this week, a senior official said as protests demanding greater freedom entered a second month.
Prime Minister Adel Safar unveiled Thursday his new cabinet, which is expected to carry out broad reforms including the lifting of a draconian emergency law imposed since Assad's Baath party seized power in 1963. The official, who declined to be named, said Assad would "chair the first session of the new council of ministers today and will deliver a speech to the cabinet ministers." "The speech will (then) be broadcast in the afternoon," by state media, the official said. The new government was promulgated in a decree by Assad and unveiled less than a month after former premier Mohammed Naji Otri resigned on March 29 amid growing pro-democracy protests. Syria also announced on Thursday an amnesty for scores of prisoners detained since protests first broke out on March 15, with a rare demonstration in Damascus calling for the release of political prisoners. Safar, a former minister of agriculture, is also expected to take steps to liberalise the restrictive laws governning the press and the formation of political parties. Tens of thousands of pro-reform protesters took to the streets of cities and towns across Syria after weekly Muslim prayers on Friday, with clashes reported in several centres. State media reported one policeman was killed in the central industrial city of Homs.
