RIYADH: Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz named his son and heir Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the kingdom's prime minister and his second son Prince Khalid as defense minister, a royal decree said on Tuesday.
The reshuffle kept another son, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, as energy minister, the royal decree, carried by state news agency SPA, said.
Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, Finance Minister Mohammed al-Jadaan and Investment Minister Khalid al-Falih remained unchanged, the decree showed.
The crown prince had previously been the defense minister of Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter and a major US ally in the Middle East. Prince Khalid bin Salman, his younger brother, previously served as deputy defense minister.
King Salman will still preside the cabinet meetings that he attends, the decree said.
The 86-year-old king, the custodian of Islam's holiest sites, became ruler in 2015 after spending more than 2-1/2 years as the crown prince. He has been hospitalised several times over the last two years.
Prince Mohammed has changed Saudi Arabia radically since 2017, leading efforts to diversify the economy from dependence on oil, allowed women to drive and curbed the clerics' power over society.
