US embassy cable - 05KUWAIT1306

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KUWAIT 001306 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA/ARPI, DRL 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/26/2015 
TAGS: KISL, KDEM, KJUS, PHUM, PREL, KU, Press Freedom 
SUBJECT: FORCED OUT?: LIBERAL COLUMNIST QUITS, DECRIES 
'BEHEADING' OF FREE SPEECH 
 
REF: KUWAIT 1192 
 
Classified By: Ambassador Richard LeBaron for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) 
 
1. (C) Summary:  Decrying the death of press freedom, Kuwait 
University Political Scientist and long-time columnist Dr. 
Ahmed Al-Baghdadi followed up on his promise to quit writing 
on March 25.  Al-Baghdadi, an extremely active critic of both 
the GOK and the increasing influence of Islamist elements in 
Kuwaiti society, is one of only a handful of columnists known 
to have been convicted under Kuwait's Press and Publications 
Law.  That the rarely enforced law has silenced a vocal 
critic of both the government and conservatives has left some 
Kuwaitis wondering if the GOK was complicit in his undoing, 
and others suggesting Al-Baghdadi didn't bring this upon 
himself.  End Summary. 
 
2. (U) "This is my last article and last words," wrote 
liberal columnist Ahmed Al-Baghdadi in the March 25 edition 
of local arabic daily Al Seyasseh.  "Goodbye to the freedom 
of speech which has been beheaded with the guillotine of the 
law." Al-Baghdadi was convicted of defaming Islam when he 
criticized the Education Ministry for cutting music classes 
from private school curricula in order to make room for 
additional classes on the Holy Quran.  The case, brought by 
three Islamists, charged Al-Baghdadi with accusing Kuwait's 
educational system of promoting extremist and terrorist 
thinking. 
 
3. (C) Al-Baghdadi's conviction has generated much debate 
over the limits of what is regarded in the Gulf as a 
relatively free Kuwaiti press environment.  While 
Al-Baghdadi's contemporary liberal columnists view the ruling 
as a violation of free speech, many moderate Kuwaitis are of 
the opinion that Baghdadi pushed his commentary too far one 
too many times.  A liberal Kuwaiti told Poloff March 28 that 
discussion in his family's diwaniya had focused on Baghdadi's 
propensity to cross the line of culturally acceptable free 
speech. "It is one thing to criticize Islamists," he said, 
"but Baghdadi appears sometimes to be anti-Islam."  Some 
Kuwaiti columnists and even Al-Baghdadi's own attorney 
agreed.  Writing in the English daily Kuwait Times on March 
29, Dr. Sami Alrabaa called Arab liberals naive for not 
recognizing that their comments, while not overtly 
anti-Islamic, would be intepreted as such by Islamists and 
used against them.  In a March 25 meeting with Poloffs, 
Al-Baghdadi's attorney, Bader al-Yacoub, confided that he had 
warned his client, who he deemed "sometimes anti-Muslim," not 
to be aggressive given the current political environment. 
 
4. (C) Despite Al-Baghdadi's reputation for being 
provocative, others have wondered if the timing of the 
conviction is related to the government's current efforts to 
combat militant Islamists.  The GOK, suspected by many of 
appeasing Islamist elements for years, has been locked in a 
struggle with proponents of the Takfiri militant ideology 
since early January, when the first of a series of gun 
battles gripped the nation, forcing the government to act 
decisively against radicals. (Note: Takfiris subscribe to a 
militant Muslim ideology that rejects the legitimacy of the 
ruling regime and calls followers to withdraw from the 
"secular" society and work violently to bring the society in 
line with their interpretation of Islam. End Note.)  The 
silencing of Al-Baghdadi, a thorn in the GOK's side, has the 
added benefit of appeasing conservative Islamists who have in 
recent months gone to great lengths to distinguish themselves 
from militants by publicly reaffirming their support for the 
government and the rule of the Al-Sabah family. 
 
5. (C) Al-Baghdadi's sentence comes after the ruling family 
publicly and privately instructed newspaper editors to 
refrain from publishing anything that could compromise 
national security in the wake of the January shoot-outs. The 
government is also backing a restrictive version of a draft 
press and publications law, in opposition to a more liberal 
draft put forward by the parliament's Education Committee, 
which has responsibility for press affairs. Committee 
Chairman MP Hassan Johwar told Emboffs January 29 that he 
believes the government will reject the liberal version 
because, he said, the GOK "is against oppenness" in both the 
press and the political system.  Although Jowhar said he does 
not approve of what Al-Baghdadi wrote, he opposes 
Al-Baghdadi's sentence on principle and believes that the 
government should be more tolerant of columnists' divergent 
views. 
 
6. (C) Comment:  While Kuwait's Press and Publications Law 
clearly limits free speech, its rare enforcement is 
indicative of a relatively high level of official tolerance 
for alternative viewpoints, especially when contrasted to 
other Gulf states.  Judging from the silence of Kuwait's 
moderate majority, it appears Al-Baghdadi may have been as 
much a victim his own actions -- deigning to appear critical 
of Islam in a society wholly intolerant of such criticism -- 
than of overly limiting free speech laws. 
********************************************* 
Visit Embassy Kuwait's Classified Website: 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/kuwait/ 
 
You can also access this site through the 
State Department's Classified SIPRNET website 
********************************************* 
LEBARON