GREECE's new Prime Minister, Mr Costas Simitis, yesterday formed a government that brings in reformists but also retains his disgruntled rivals from the previous cabinet.
His two major rivals for the leadership of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (Pasok), Mr Gerassimos Arsenis and Mr Akis Tsohatzopoulos, retain their posts as Defence Minister and Interior Minister respectively.
Two prominent reformists, Mr Theodore Pangalos and Dr Vasso Papandreou - no relation to the former prime minister, Mr Andreas Papandreou - have been brought into the cabinet.
Mr Pangalos has been named Foreign Minister and Ms Papandreou has been given a new portfolio as Minister of Development, assuming responsibility for tourism, industry and trade.
Mr Yannos Papantoniou remains Economics Minister and Mr Alekos Papadopoulos stays on as Finance Minister. Both had supported Mr Simitis in his leadership fight. Mr Simitis was elected by the Pasok parliamentary party last Thursday to replace Mr Papandreou, who had resigned on Monday after two months of illness.
Mr Pangalos is noted as a colourful, outspoken personality who, before Greece's first EU presidency, once compared Germany to "a giant with the strength of an animal and the brain of a child." He also criticised his EU partners for allowing Turkey to drag its bloodied boots on [their] European carpets.
The grandson of a general, he was prominent in the struggles by the left in the 1960s, and was exiled by the colonels who ruled Greece from 1967 to 1974. Although he held several positions in previous Pasok governments, mainly on European affairs, he enjoyed little support within the party and was also critical of Mr Papandreou.
Ms Papandreou studied in Britain and is noted as a pro European modernist who worked alongside former president of the European Commission, Mr Jacques Delors.
She has been a member of Pasok's central committee for 2 years after being singled out by her namesake but, partly influenced by her experience in Europe, turned against him and several times refused to take up ministries he offered her.
The remainder of the Simitis cabinet excludes close Papandreou protege's, but two of his former colleagues, Mr Anastassios Peponnis and Mr Evangelos Yannopoulos, take up the health and labour ministries respectively.
The new cabinet is due to be sworn in today.