Muhammad Naji al-Otari (born 1944) is a Syria

Syria

Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

n politician who was Prime Minister of Syria from 2003 to 2011.

Early life, education and career

Born in Syria's largest city Aleppo

Aleppo

Aleppo is the largest city in Syria and the capital of Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Syrian governorate. With an official population of 2,301,570 , expanding to over 2.5 million in the metropolitan area, it is also one of the largest cities in the Levant...

 in 1944, he studied architecture

Architecture

Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...

 and has a diploma in urban planning

Urban planning

Urban planning incorporates areas such as economics, design, ecology, sociology, geography, law, political science, and statistics to guide and ensure the orderly development of settlements and communities....

 from the Netherlands

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

. He is fluent in French

French language

French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 and English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

.

He headed the city council in Aleppo from 1983 to 1987 and is a former governor of Homs

Homs

Homs , previously known as Emesa , is a city in western Syria and the capital of the Homs Governorate. It is above sea level and is located north of Damascus...

. He was president of Aleppo's engineering syndicate from 1989 to 1993.

Al-Otari is a long-serving member of the ruling Baath Party

Baath Party

The Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party was a political party mixing Arab nationalist and Arab socialist interests, opposed to Western imperialism, and calling for the renaissance or resurrection and unification of the Arab world into a single state. Ba'ath is also spelled Ba'th or Baath and means...

. In March 2000 he became a member of the Baath Party's Central Committee and in June 2000 of the party's influential Regional Command. In March 2000 he was also appointed deputy prime minister for services affairs.

Speaker of Parliament

He was elected speaker of the Syrian parliament, or People's Assembly, in March 2003.

Prime Minister

He was first appointed Prime Minister on 10 September 2003. His nomination has been said to combine both "technocratic and Baathist trends" in Syrian politics. On 29 March 2011, the entire cabinet resigned; al-Otari remained in office in a caretaker capacity.In 3 April 2011, President Assad appointed Adel Safar

Adel Safar

Adel Safar is a Syrian politician and academic, serving as Prime Minister of Syria since 3 April 2011. He previously served as Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform from 2003 to 2011.-Early life and education:...

to succeed Otari.