Authorities arrest man for threatening politician

Kuwait City: Kuwaiti authorities have arrested a man for allegedly threatening to kill a liberal MP for proposing amendments to laws enforcing segregation of the sexes at universities, Kuwaiti newspapers reported on Thursday.

English language Arab Times reported that the Interior Ministry arrested a 32-year-old Kuwaiti for threatening MP Ali Al Rashid.

It quoted the Interior Minister Shaikh Jaber Al Khalid as saying the interrogation started to "determine the motive behind threatening Al Rashid and if he has any accomplices." The minister said the police has not yet concluded whether the suspect belongs to any Islamic group.

"Security sources said the suspect is a retired Ministry of Information employee. Initial investigations revealed he used the telephone line of his wife's Indian driver when he threatened Al Rashid," the paper said. The speaker of parliament has condemned the death threats against the MP, saying such actions destabilise the democratic system in the Kuwaiti state.

"People can have different views on certain issues but they should not resort to violence to express their objection to other points of view," Jasem Al Khorafi said. "It goes without say that any law passed by parliament has to gain the approval of the majority of legislators. Thus, such threats are of no relevance," he added.

MP Ali Al Rashid's office received a phone call on Tuesday in which an anonymous person threatened to shoot him if he decides to go forth with the submission of a draft bill to cancel an existing law on gender segregation at Kuwaiti universities.

Al Rashid had previously revealed his intention, along with two other parliamentarians from the National Labour Bloc, to present the National Assembly with a draft law.

Intention

Al Rashid's intention to cancel gender segregation laws has raised debates within the parliament as Islamists denounced the proposal, yet accepted that the law be amended. Al Rashid, who was among supporters of the Minister of Education and Higher Education Nouriyah Al Sebih during the grilling that took place last month, described the segregation law as "a total failure that had backfired."

Kuwaiti parliament passed a law in 1996 stipulating that male and female students at Kuwaiti Universities and other higher education institutions be completely separated. It also passed another law in 2000 extending the ban on co-education to private universities.

Meanwhile, Islamists in parliament vowed to vote against this proposal affirming that the currently implemented segregation law depicts the viewpoints of the national and parliamentarian majority.

The delay in implementing the gender segregation law was among factors by which Islamist MP Sa'ad Al Sherai based his grilling against Al Sebih last month.

Faced with a chance of being eliminated from the political arena, Al Sebih, the first female Kuwaiti minister to undergo a grilling, took serious actions towards implementing the law.