Manama: A Kuwaiti teenager has died after being stabbed during a fight at a mall in the capital Kuwait City.
The 16-year-old boy reportedly was stabbed in the chest on Thursday evening and was pronounced dead at Al Mubarak Hospital.
Another boy, also 16, was injured in the incident and was admitted to intensive care but his condition is said to be stable.
According to the Kuwaiti daily Al Jareeda, six people were arrested after they were identified via the mall’s CCTV.
The murder, the third in a crowded mall in three years, is likely to spark nationwide calls for stricter measures against criminals and firmer stances against crimes.
In 2013, a 24-year-old Kuwait died on the spot after being attacked by three young men, two Bidoon (residents without valid documents) and a Kuwaiti, at the Marina Mall reportedly in an argument that ended fatally.
Witnesses said that all the young men were initially embroiled in a brawl, but were separated by people at the mall. However, the argument continued on a flight of stairs where one of the assailants pulled out a knife and stabbed the victim identified as Jamal Al Enezi. The three aggressors were arrested within hours of the murder.
In December 2012, Jaber Yousuf, a 26-year-old dentist born to a Kuwaiti mother and a Lebanese father, was killed by four friends at The Avenues, Kuwait’s largest shopping mall following an altercation in the car park.
Reports said that Jaber, his brother, a cousin and a friend had an argument over traffic priorities with four people in another car.
However, while the argument was over for Jaber and his companions by the time they entered the mall and went to a coffee shop, it was not for the other four young men — two Iraqi brothers, a Saudi national and a Bidoon (stateless) who reportedly wanted the fight to continue until the score was settled in their favour.
They allegedly took knives from a shop at the mall, walked up to the four friends and resumed the dispute.
The stateless youth, 22, reportedly pulled out a knife he had hidden under his clothes and stabbed the dentist to death. The attackers wounded two other people before fleeing.
A massive manhunt was launched by the police who used the footage of the two cars arriving at the shopping complex to track the stateless man and arrest him in his hideout in a desert area.
During his confession, he gave the names of his friends. The Saudi national was arrested later. The hunt for the two Iraqi accomplices took five days with security officers monitoring all areas where they could possibly hide. The brothers eventually understood that they could not go on hiding forever and surrendered.
A court sentenced the killer to death and his accomplices to life in prison. The verdict was upheld by the Court of Appeals and by the Cassation Court, the country’s highest court whose verdicts are final.
