Syrian prime minister ‘defects to Jordan’

Riad Farid Hijab, the Syrian prime minister, has fled the country, activists say, after state television reported that he was sacked this morning.
The former prime minister arrived in Jordan after being smuggled across the border, Jordanian authorities confirmed to Al Jazeera on Monday.
President Bashar al-Assad appointed Hijab, a former agriculture minister, on June 23, following a parliamentary election in May.
Omar Ghaliwanji, Syria’s deputy prime minister, has been chosen to lead a caretaker government, state media reported on Monday.
Authorities hailed the May poll as being a major step towards political reform, but the opposition movement against Assad’s government dismissed them as a sham.
Hijab had been a part of the Baath party command since 1998, and was appointed as the head of the Latakia governate when anti-government protests first broke out there last year.
Such sackings are a common way for state television to react when an official has defected.
Al Jazeera’s Rula Amin, reporting from Beirut in neighbouring Lebanon, said that while Hijab was not a key member of Assad’s inner circle, were he to join the opposition he would be the most high-profile official to have rejected Assad’s authority.
George Jabbour, a past advisor to former Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, told Al Jazeera that the development was “certainly significant”.

Source: Al Jazeera And Agencies