MIDDLE EAST:Salam Fayyad - an economist, MP and former finance minister - is well known in western financial circles following an eight-year stint at the World Bank and six years as the International Monetary Fund's representative to the Palestinian Authority.
Born near Tulkarm in the West Bank in 1952, he was educated in Lebanon and Texas, and spent 20 years in the US. He returned to Palestine in 2002 as finance minister, working to stamp out official corruption.
After Hamas won elections in 2006, he rejected overtures to be prime minister. He returned to the finance ministry this year as part of a Saudi-brokered deal to establish the ill-fated national unity government.
He is married with three children.