Cyprus' new foreign, finance ministers named

Newly elected Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades has named a foreign and a finance minister to his Cabinet, AP reported. Anastasiades announced Monday that he has chosen Michalis Sarris to the financial post and Ioannis Kasoulides to oversee foreign affairs once the president begins his 5-year term on March 1. Sarris, 66, helped usher the country into the eurozone as finance minister in 2008. Kasoulides, 64, served as foreign minister in 1997-2003 and played an important role in steering Cyprus toward European Union membership. Anastasiades, who was elected on Sunday, also appointed the 65-year-old Christopher Pissarides, a Nobel Prize winner in economics, to head a national economics advisory body. Cash-strapped Cyprus is looking to finalize a rescue package with international lenders by the end of next month to avoid going bankrupt.