Liberal Lessons From Kuwait

In Kuwait, the country that we trashed Iraq for in order to defend it as a bastion of rationality and liberal values (well they have oil and US President Bush was a friend of the ruling family) .....

Kuwaiti MPs Osama al-Shahin (L) and Shaaya al-Shaaya
arrive hand-in-hand to attend a Parliament session. Nice.

... there has been another bout of modernism.

 

Yes they have legislated on the use of social media such as Facebook, and Twitter. Of course, Kuwait being part of the Muslim enlightenment, this legislation has a twist on it that we in less liberal countries might not have expected. 

 

So rather than some 'anti account fraud' or 'anti-trolling' laws, they decided that defending their prophet, and Sunni rulers was the priority. So naturally the first the rest of us hear about this move into 21st century legislation is when one Hamad al-Naqi is convicted, and then sentenced to 10 years in prison for endangering state security, by insulting the Prophet Muhammad and the rulers of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in messages on Twitter. 

 

Just to ensure that he stayed well buried in prison, he was also found guilty of 'mocking Islam', and provoking sectarian tensions. Needless to say he is a Shia Muslim, and all these states are ruled by Sunni dynasties .... but that's just a coincidence, because with about a third of Kuwait's 1.1 million citizens being Shia, there can't be any discrimination, can there?

Mr al-Naqi, or rather his lawyer, is now claiming the tried and tested defence of "My account was hacked" .... which suggests that he or his lawyer is rather more I.T. savvy than the legislators, but that might count against him, as its likely that these law makers won't actually understand what this defence means.

When questioned about the severity of these sentences, the Kuwaitis pointed out that as many Sunni hard-liners had demanded the death penalty for alleged blasphemy, but he had only got 10yrs, that proved that they were being progressive and liberal in only giving him such a 'light sentence'.

In fact it later came to light that he was lucky to have been charged when he was, because they have since amended the law once again to stipulate that capital punishment applies to any Muslim who, through any form of expression, insults God, his prophets, messengers, the Prophet Muhammad's wives or the Koran, unless the defendant publicly repents. If the defendant repents, a sentence of at least five years' imprisonment will be imposed. Repeat offenders will receive the death sentence.

Aren't we glad that we started the first of a major series of wars, that have since cost untold hundreds of thousands of lives across first Kuwait, and then Iraq, then Afghanistan, and then Iraq again, initially just to defend the 'liberal' oil Sheiks of Kuwait.