MP urges govt to treat bedoons like immigrants in France

KUWAIT: Senior defense ministry, interior ministry and national guard officials hold a coordination meeting yesterday. - KUNA

KUWAIT: Kuwait's defense ministry, interior ministry and national guard held a coordination meeting yesterday at the Operations and Planning Authority to discuss joint cooperation to address regional conditions. The defense ministry's directorate of moral guidance and public relations said in a statement that the joint meeting depicted the joint and ongoing cooperation between the security and military establishments for the service of homeland security and citizens.

The meeting was attended by Chief of the General Staff of the Kuwaiti Army Lt-Gen Mohammad Khaled Al-Khodr, Interior Ministry's Acting Undersecretary Lt Gen Essam Al-Nahham and Head of Operations and Planning at the National Guard Maj Gen Faleh Shujaa, the statement added. The security and military officers briefed the meeting on the latest precautionary measures and steps taken to tackle the latest regional developments. They examined common plans, missions and joint training programs as well as coordination mechanisms, it said.

Taking part in the coordinative meeting were Deputy Chief of Staff Gen Sheikh Abdullah Al-Nawaf Al-Sabah, Assistant Chief of Staff for Operations and Planning Brig Gen Mohammed Al-Kandari, MoI's Assistant Undersecretary for Operations Maj-Gen Jamal Al-Sayegh and a number of high-ranking military officials.

Separately, MP Saleh Ashour yesterday urged the government to benefit from employing thousands of stateless people or bedoons, recalling the example of how naturalized African immigrants won the World Cup for France. "France won the World Cup thanks to naturalized Africans. Here we have hundreds of doctors, engineers, teachers, technicians and administrators from the bedoons but they are not being employed to benefit the country. This is unfair," Ashour wrote on his Twitter account. He also questioned the "wrong policy" being adopted by the government over the bedoons.

There are around 120,000 bedoons living in Kuwait who claim the right to Kuwaiti citizenship. The government says that a majority of the bedoons or their ancestors arrived from other countries and destroyed their identification documents to claim the right to citizenship. The government however admits that around 34,000 of the bedoons qualify for consideration for citizenship while the rest have no right.

Meanwhile, liberal MP Omar Al-Tabtabaei yesterday called for a solution that is in line with the constitution over the jailing of opposition MPs and activists who were convicted of storming the National Assembly building around seven years ago. Tabtabaei said the lawmakers and activists had been sentenced to jail for their political positions and after fighting corruption, adding that their action of entering the Assembly was a reaction to corruption scandals.

The lawmaker called for resolving the issue by closing this chapter to strengthen domestic stability and national unity amid destabilization factors in the region. Tabtabaei said he totally respects the Kuwaiti judiciary and its verdicts but called for a solution under the Kuwaiti constitution in a bid to prevent any unwanted negative consequences.

By B Izzak and Agencies