Jordan's king suspends fuel price hike after nationwide protests

AMMAN, Sept. 2 (Xinhua) -- King Abdullah II of Jordan on Sunday suspended a government decision to increase prices of fuel after protests broke out across the country.

In a statement carried by the state-run Petra news agency, the Jordanian leader ordered the government to freeze its decision to increase the prices of gasoline and diesel since Sunday night.

The Jordanian leader made the order after nationwide protests that called for sacking the government of Fayez Tarawneh for taking the decision. The lower house also called Sunday on the king to oust the government of Tarawneh.

On Friday, the Jordanian government raised the price of 90- octane gasoline by 10 percent from 0.70 Jordanian dinars (0.99 U.S. dollars) to 0.77 dinars (1.09 dollars).

It also increased the price of diesel from 0.515 dinars (0.73 dollars) to 0.550 dinars (0.78 dollars).

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