FACTBOX: Portraits of new French government ministers

(Reuters) - French President Nicolas Sarkozy unveiled a slimline cabinet on Friday that included centrists, a popular left-wing maverick as well as members of the ruling conservative Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) party.

Follows are brief portraits of the new team.

ALAIN JUPPE, 61, MINISTER OF STATE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

The political career of Juppe, a former prime minister, appeared over when he was forced to quit as head of the UMP party in 2004 after being convicted in a party funding scandal, allowing his one-time rival Sarkozy to take over the party.

His return as government number two at the head of a new super-ministry represents a great comeback and he'll need all his formidable intelligence to mould the unwieldy new portfolio into a coherent unit.

Described by former President Jacques Chirac as the "best among us", Juppe was his first prime minister in 1995. But voters thought he was aloof and his ratings sank as huge street protests forced him to abandon a key pension reform plans.

Chirac called snap elections in 1997 to seek a mandate for reform, but he lost and a humbled Juppe was forced from office.

After his party funding conviction, Juppe took up a teaching post in Canada where he developed the ecologist views which led to his latest appointment. He returned to France in 2006.

MICHELE ALLIOT-MARIE, 60, INTERIOR

The most experienced of the female politicians in the new cabinet, Alliot-Marie is universally known by her initials MAM.

She has held various ministerial positions and was appointed defense minister in 2002 where she built a reputation for being a safe pair of hands and quietly efficient.

A no-nonsense politician, MAM surprised everyone to snatch control of Chirac's RPR party in defiance of the president. She helped restore its fortunes and the party, transformed into the UMP in 2002, won a huge parliamentary majority that same year.

The interior ministry has been stripped of the immigration brief -- a downgrading that reduces the scope of the job.

HERVE MORIN, 45, DEFENCE

When centrist leader Francois Bayrou announced his new party on May 10, Morin was sitting in Sarkozy's office working out the details of his defection from Bayrou's inner circle.