The announcement of the 22-minister cabinet followed difficult negotiations with political parties and came in the face of widespread international condemnation of the bloodless overthrow of President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi.
The government named by the military High Council of State kept on four key ministers -- for Defence, Finance, Economy and Justice -- who had served under Abdallahi, who is in detention.
General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz's ruling junta also brought into the cabinet officials and technocrats who had worked in the transitional government under military control that handed over to civilian rule in 2007 after multi-party elections.
On Aug. 14, the junta had named Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf, a respected former ambassador to Belgium and the European Union, as prime minister.
The coup has garnered some support in Mauritania's political establishment, but the main opposition Rally of Democratic Forces (RFD) and others have refused to participate in the new government. There have been some protests against the junta.
Former colonial power France rejected the new government.
"As with all the measures taken by the military leaders who have seized power, and especially the dismissal of the president, we consider this decision to lack any legitimacy," Foreign Ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier said.
"We call for the immediate liberation of President Abdallahi and a return to constitutional order," he said in a briefing.
Aid Suspended
Opponents have criticised the junta for failing to give a timetable for the elections it has promised "as soon as possible" and for not ruling out its own members from standing.The African Union has suspended Mauritania and major donors such as France and the United States, which have viewed the Western Saharan nation as an ally in the fight against Islamist militants, have frozen some non-humanitarian aid.
Coup leader Abdel Aziz has said Abdallahi was incapable of tackling economic woes squeezing Mauritania's poor population.
Soaring food and fuel prices have triggered sporadic street riots in Mauritania, which depends heavily on iron ore mining and fisheries and became Africa's newest oil producer in 2006.
Former Finance Ministry official Die Ould Zeine became oil minister and Mohamed Abdellahi Ould Oudaa, who previously ran a private energy and water company, took the industry and mines portfolio. University professor Mohamed Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, who has worked in the United States, became foreign minister.
A separate decree named Mohamed Lemine Ould Guig, a former prime minister under authoritarian ex-President Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya, as secretary-general of the High State Council junta, a post with ministerial rank though not part of the prime minister's cabinet. Taya was toppled in a bloodless 2005 coup.
Some of the new team, including Mines Minister Oudaa, have links with the RFD opposition led by veteran politician Ahmed Ould Daddah. But shortly before the new government was announced, Daddah reiterated his party would not join it.
"Any member of the party who agrees to participate in the government will be automatically considered as having resigned from the party," Daddah said in a statement.
