Manama: A Kuwaiti appeals court has postponed its verdict in the case of a lawyer and writer to December 15. Mohammad Al Jasem was last month jailed to one year for allegedly defaming the country's prime minister.

In his defence, Mohammad Al Jasem said that the case should be thrown out and that he should not have been tried for his article.

In the article "Nasser XVII", the writer who also has a blog, charged that Iranian intelligence was interfering in Kuwait's affairs through a leading businessman who had close ties with Shaikh Nasser Mohammad Al Sabah, the prime minister. However, Mohammad later denied that he had accused the prime minister of collaborating with Iranian intelligence.

The one-year sentence has, expectedly, divided Kuwaiti society, with one side claiming that it was a suppression of freedom of speech and the other side saying that the article amounted to accusing the prime minister of treason and was not a matter of freedom of opinion.

Al Jasem also faces several other cases, mostly for alleged slander.