Zbigniew Rau, up to now the chairman of the foreign affairs committee in the lower house of parliament, is taking over as Poland’s top diplomat.
Meanwhile, the head of Poland’s National Health Fund (NFZ), Adam Niedzielski, has been appointed health minister.
The two men were sworn in at a ceremony in the presidential palace in Warsaw.
Rau is a lawyer and a university professor, and was governor of the central Łódź province from 2015 to 2019. He has also been a senator.
He takes over as foreign minister from Jacek Czaputowicz, who was in the post since January 2018.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki announced last Thursday that Rau and Niedzielski would be appointed.
They will hold key posts in Poland’s conservative government amid a crisis in neighbouring Belarus and a second wave of the coronavirus on the horizon.
Morawiecki confirmed on Tuesday that his government would undergo a reshuffle by the end of September or in early October.
Poland’s conservative leader Jarosław Kaczyński, who heads the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, has previously said that Morawiecki himself will keep his job.
(pk)