By Nawara Fattahova

KUWAIT: The 'Kuwait in Our Hearts' volunteer group, in cooperation with the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters (NCCAL), organized a tour of Al-Qurain Martyrs House Museum (Bait Al-Qurain) yesterday. Twenty-eight volunteer teams participated in this tour, in addition to some school students, to commemorate the martyrs who died during the battle at Bait Al-Qurain.

Head of the group Al-Anoud Al-Dhafiri said for the past four years, the group conducts a tour of Qurain Martyrs House to commemorate this occasion. "This is the house of martyrs and we are holding this activity to commemorate them. We aim to highlight the great role of the martyrs who gave their lives to defend Kuwait during the invasion and teach the new generations of the braveness of these martyrs, their sacrifices and their love for Kuwait," she told Kuwait Times.

"We will keep organizing this tour every year to teach the kids about this memory. We also organize other national activities during the year on other occasions. This museum represents part of our history, and is a live picture of Kuwait's resistance and fight against the aggressor," added Dhafiri.

Salman Boland, Supervisor of Museums at NCCAL, said this house witnessed the fight of the Messila Group of resistance fighters who defended the country with simple guns, while the Iraqi army was fighting them with heavy weapons that destroyed a great part of the house. The group resisted for 10 hours until they were overwhelmed by the invaders, he added.

"The late Amir of Kuwait Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmed Al-Jaber Al-Sabah ordered to preserve Bait Al-Qurain and transfer it into a museum in the early 1990s to be a witness of an important part of Kuwait's history. Since then, every year on the same days - February 24, 25 and 26 - we cooperate with volunteer groups to visit this place along with students.

And we hope that more people come to visit this museum during the whole year to see the heroic role of the Kuwaiti nation," Boland said. The museum is open daily from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm and from 4:30 pm to 8:30 pm except Friday. On National and Liberation Days, it's open the entire day.