Kuwait

Online journalist Ayyad al-Harbi was sentenced to two years in jail for insulting the Kuwaiti ruling family on social media.

Peaceful protests surrounding participation in Kuwait’s political process have witnessed excessive violence by security forces since October 2012.

Kuwaiti detainees imprisoned during protests in October have been released.

Kuwait’s Interior Ministry announced the implementation of a ban on unlicensed assemblies of more than 20 people in public areas.

Several protesters were arrested and others injured, following an assault by Kuwaiti forces on an anti-government protest.

Police used force to suppress a peaceful demonstration organised by stateless activists demanding Kuwaiti citizenship and arrested several protesters.

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information condemns the shutting down of a Kuwaiti TV channel, El-Nahg, 24 hours after its launch. On Monday, 24 September, the Ministry of Information stopped El-Nahg from broadcasting. The channel is affiliated with the dissolved, opposition-dominated parliament.

Blogger Abdulaziz Bou-Hamid was arrested after a report was filed against him by a police officer, accusing him of slander and libel.

Several representatives of human rights organisations and some journalists were banned from joining the demonstration, while protesters were attacked with tear gas, and sound and water cannons.

Hamad al-Naqi was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment for allegedly insulting the prophet Muhammad, the divine being and the rulers of Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

Lawrence al-Rashidi was found guilty of “insulting the Prince and his powers in poems uploaded on YouTube.”

Scope TV was ordered to pay approximately 1,360,000 euros to the former information minister Sheikh Faisal Al-Malek Al-Sabah, a member of the ruling family, for having broadcast a programme last October that the court deemed offensive to the royal family.

On 1 May, between 200 and 300 Bidun gathered near al-Sha’bi mosque in Taima’a to demand government action on their citizenship claims and resolution of their stateless status only to be met with force and arrests.

The National Assembly voted in favour of a legal amendment which could make insulting God and the Prophet Mohammed punishable by death.

Mohamed al-Melify was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment and a fine of 18 thousand dollars on charges of spreading false news about about sectarian divisions in the country as well as libeling MP Ahmed Lari.

Kuwait is not the first state that has blocked “al-Watan”‘s website: it is blocked within Saudi Arabia and Syria, and was blocked in both Egypt and Tunisia during their revolutions.