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KIGALI, July 17 (AFP) - Agathe Uwilingiyimana, a 40-year-old chemist serving as education minister, has been named prime minister of Rwanda, government officials said Saturday.
She was appointed after a meeting Friday between President Juvenal Habyarimana and the five parties that make up his government.
Uwilingiyimana, who belongs to the same party as the outgoing prime minister Dismas Nsengiyaremye, the opposition Democratic Republican Movement (MDR), is expected to form a new government within three days.
She has been advised to retain the existing ministers apart from the vacant posts at the ministries of justice and education.
Four of the five parties in the transitional government rejected Nsengiyaremye's candidacy.
The new government will have the task of bringing the Arusha talks with the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) to a successful conclusion with the signing of a peace accord and security guarantees.
The peace agreement, concluded after 11 months of tortuous negotiations under Tanzanian mediation, was originally set to be signed June 24 in the northern Tanzanian town of Arusha, but was postponed at the last minute after President Habyarimana refused to attend the ceremony.
The peace agreement is designed to end two years of civil war in the central African nation between government forces dominated by the majority Hutus and the rebels from the minority Tutsis.
mgu/lp/bm AFP AFP SEQN-0233
