Kuwait Notes

Source http://www.arab.de/arabinfo/kuwait.htm

where it is: Kuwait is situated in the northeastern part of the Arabian Peninsula, at the head of the Persian Gulf. Kuwait is bordered on the north and west by Iraq, on the south and west bySaudi Arabia, and on the east by the Persian Gulf. For many years Kuwait was a small emirate whose economy centered on sea trade and especially pearl exports. The discovery of oil in the 20th century transformed all aspects of Kuwaiti society.

Landmarks:

• Kuwait Towers : One of Kuwait's most famous landmarks, the Kuwait Towers are situated on Arabian Gulf Street on a promontory to the east of the City centre in Dasman. The uppermost sphere of the largest tower (which is 187 metres high) has a revolving observation area and a restaurant with access by high speed lifts. The entrance fee is 350 fils per person, or free if lunch or dinner has been reserved. Cameras with zoom lens are forbidden. The middle tower contains 1 million gallons of water. • The Liberation Tower-The symbol of Kuwaiti liberation, the unmistakable sign of the country's resurgence, the Liberation Tower is the fifth tallest telecommunications tower in the world.This telecommunication tower in Kuwait City was inaugurated by the late the Amir, Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah on March 10, 1996. This 372-metre structure is about 40 metres taller than the Eiffel Tower! It was named after the multinational coalition that liberated the nation from seven months of Iraqi occupation during the Gulf War. The tower has now become a symbol of resurgent Kuwait. The structure uses ceramic tiles on the facade from the base to the first mezzanine level, which is about 308 metres above the ground. Three light natural shades provide a geometric design from the base.The tower and the telecommunications complex is divided into three Working Areas: a public communications centre; the revolving observation level and restaurant at 150 metres; and the adjacent plant and equipment structure. There are 18 elevators, two of which are glass enclosed and can accommodate 21 passengers each. They are also among the fastest in the world at 6.3 metres per second. Above the revolving mezzanine, six floors of offices with a total floor space of 12,000 sq m rise up and out in a section encased in anodised aluminium, designed to withstand Kuwait's extreme temperatures.

• Mosque-The pyramid-shaped mosque in Ras Salmiya and the Fatima Mosque in Abdullah Al-Salem are fine examples of modern architecture. The Grand Mosque, opposite the Seif Palace, is an example of several traditional Islamic styles using modern technology while retaining the local characteristics of Kuwait as well as preserving the Islamic tradition of calligraphy. There are several examples of mosques dating from the last century still visited by worshipers around Kuwait City.http://www.kuwait-info.com/a_tourism/tourism_place_interest_more.asp http://www.kuwait-info.com/a_tourism/tourism_place_interest_more.asp Languages: Arabic http://www.arab.de/arabinfo/kuwait.htm

Flag meaning: Kuwait's national flag officially came into being on 7 th September 1961 and was used first on 24 th November 1961. The Kuwait flag has three horizontal and equal stripes of green, white and red color and at the hoisting part of the flag there is a black quadrilateral with two parallel sides. The ratio of the flag 's width to its length is 1:2. The significance of the colors

in the flag of Kuwait are based on a poem of Al-Deen Al-Hali. According to the poem, green represents the lands, white represents Kuwait's actions, red signifies sword and black represents their battles. http://www.mapsofworld.com/flags/kuwait-flag.html

Population: In 1997 Kuwait had an estimated population of 1,834,269. The average population density was 103 persons per sq km (267 per sq mi). Most of the population is concentrated in cities near or along the Persian Gulf coast. Slightly fewer than 40 percent of the people are native Kuwaitis, while the remainder of the population, for the most part, are foreign workers. The majority of immigrants are from other Arab countries as well as Iran, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines. http://www.arab.de/arabinfo/kuwait.htm

Persian Gulf Wars Gulf War1 The First Persian Gulf War,. Jan.–Feb., 1991, was an armed conflict between Iraq and a coalition of 32 nations including the United States, Britain, Egypt, France, and Saudi Arabia. It was a result of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait on Aug. 2, 1990; Iraq then annexed Kuwait, which it had long claimed. Iraqi president Saddam Hussein declared that the invasion was a response to overproduction of oil in Kuwait, which had cost Iraq an estimated $14 billion a year when oil prices fell. Hussein also accused Kuwait of illegally pumping oil from Iraq's Rumaila oil field. The UN Security Council called for Iraq to withdraw and subsequently embargoed most trade with Iraq. On Aug. 7, U.S. troops moved into Saudi Arabia to protect Saudi oil fields. On Nov. 29, the United Nations set Jan. 15, 1991, as the deadline for a peaceful withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait. When Saddam Hussein refused to comply, Operation Desert Storm was launched on Jan. 18, 1991, under the leadership of U.S. Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf. The U.S.-led coalition began a massive air war to destroy Iraq's forces and military and civil infrastructure. Iraq called for terrorist attacks against the coalition and launched Scud missiles at Israel (in an unsuccessful attempt to widen the war and break up the coalition) and at Saudi Arabia. The main coalition forces invaded Kuwait and S Iraq on Feb. 24 and, over the next four days, encircled and defeated the Iraqis and liberated Kuwait. When U.S. President George H. W. Bush declared a cease-fire on Feb. 28, most of the Iraqi forces in Kuwait had either surrendered or fled. Although the war was a decisive military victory for the coalition, Kuwait and Iraq suffered enormous property damage, and Saddam Hussein was not removed from power. In fact, Hussein was free to turn his attention to suppressing internal Shiite and Kurd revolts, which the U.S.-led coalition did not support, in part because of concerns over the possible breakup of Iraq if the revolts were successful. Coalition peace terms were agreed to by Iraq, but every effort was made by the Iraqis to frustrate implementation of the terms, particularly UN weapons inspections. In 1993 the United States, France, and Britain launched several air and cruise-missile strikes against Iraq in response to provocations, including an alleged Iraqi plan to assassinate former President George H. W. Bush. An Iraqi troop buildup near Kuwait in 1994 led the United States to send forces to Kuwait and nearby areas. Continued resistance to weapons inspections led to bombing raids against Iraq, and trade sanctions imposed on Iraq remained in place, albeit with an emphasis on military-related goods until the second Gulf conflict. See also Gulf War Syndrome. Gulf War2

The Second Persian Gulf War,. also known as the Iraq War, Mar.–Apr., 2003, was a largely U.S.-British invasion of Iraq. In many ways the final, delayed campaign of the First Persian Gulf War, it arose in part because the Iraqi government failed to cooperate fully with UN weapons inspections in the years following the first conflict. The election of George W. Bush to the U.S. presidency returned to government many officials from his father's administration who had favored removing Saddam Hussein from power in the first war. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, the United States moved toward a doctrine of first-strike, pre-emptive war to eliminate threats to national security. As early as Oct., 2001, U.S. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld publicly suggested that military action against Iraq was possible, and in November President Bush asked Rumsfeld to undertake a war-plan review. In Jan., 2002, President Bush accused Iraq. along with North Korea and Iran, as being part of “an axis of evil,” and with the Taliban forced from power in Afghanistan in early 2002, the administration's attention turned to Iraq. Accusing Iraq of failing to abide by the terms of the 1991 cease-fire (by developing and possessing weapons of mass destruction and by refusing to cooperate with UN weapons inspections) and of supporting terrorism, the president and other officials suggested that the “war on terrorism” might be expanded to include Iraq and became more forceful in their denunciations of Iraq for resisting UN arms inspections, called for “regime change” in Iraq, and leaked news of military planning for war. President Bush also called on the United Nations to act forcefully against Iraq or risk becoming “irrelevant.” As a result, Iraq announced in Sept., 2002, that UN inspectors could return, but Iraqi slowness to agree on inspection terms and U.S. insistence on stricter conditions for Iraqi compliance stalled the inspectors' return. In October, Congress approved the use of force against Iraq, and in November the Security Council passed a resolution offering Iraq a “final opportunity” to cooperate on arms inspections. A strict inspections timetable was established, and active Iraqi compliance insisted on. Inspections resumed in late November. A December declaration by Iraq that it had no weapons of mass destruction was generally regarded as incomplete and uninformative, but by Jan., 2003, UN inspectors had found no evidence of forbidden weapons programs. However, they also indicated that Iraq was not actively cooperating with their efforts to determine if previously known or suspected weapons had been destroyed and weapons programs had been ended. Despite much international opposition, including increasingly rancorous objections from France, Germany, and Russia, the United States and Britain continued their military buildup in areas near Iraq, insisting that Iraq was hiding weapons of mass destruction. Turkey, which the allies hoped to use as a base for a northern front in Iraq, refused to allow use of its territory, but most Anglo-American forces were in place in Kuwait and other locations by March. After failing to win the explicit UN Security Council approval desired by Britain (because Britons were otherwise largely opposed to war), President Bush issued an ultimatum to Iraqi president Hussein on Mar. 17, and two days later the war began with an airstrike against Hussein and the Iraqi leadership. Ground forces (almost exclusively AngloAmerican and significantly smaller than the large international force assembled in the first war) began invading the following day, surging primarily toward Baghdad, the southern oil fields, and port facilities; a northern front was opened by Kurdish and airborne AngloAmerican forces late in March. By mid-April, 2003, Hussein's army and government had collapsed, he himself had disappeared, and the allies were largely in control of the major Iraqi cities. The allies gradually turned their attention to the rebuilding of Iraq and the establishment of a new Iraqi government, but progress toward that end was hampered by lawlessness, especially in Baghdad, where widespread looting initially had been tolerated by U.S. forces. On May 1, President Bush declared victory in the war against Iraq. No weapons of mass destruction, however, were found, leading to charges that U.S. and British leaders had exaggerated the Iraqi biological and chemical threat in order to justify the war. Much of the

intelligence used to justify the war subsequently was criticized as faulty by U.S. and British investigative bodies. Hussein was captured in Dec., 2003. In 2004, he was transferred to Iraqi legal custody; tried and convicted of crimes against humanity, he was executed in 2006. U.S.-led occupation forces and, later, Iraqi security forces, struggled into 2007 with Iraqi and Islamic insurgencies and sectarian violence that military and civilian planners had failed to foresee. http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0838511.html

Prime Minister Sabah 3 Al-Salim Al-Sabah Sabah III Al-Salim Al-Sabah, KCMG (1913 - December 31, 1977) (Arabic: ‫صباح السالم الصباح‬‎) Emir of Kuwait from 1965 to 1977, and youngest son of Salim Al-Mubarak Al-Sabah. Sabah III Al-Salim Al-Sabah succeeded his half-brother Abdullah III Al-Salim Al-Sabah upon his death on November 4, 1965. He was the 12th ruler of the Al-Sabah dynasty of Kuwait, and the second bearing the title of "Emir". He died from cancer on December 31, 1977. Prior to his ascension, he served as the president of the police department from 1953 to 1959, President of the public health department from 1959 to 1961, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1962 to 1963, and Prime Minister from 1963 to 1965. He was appointed as Crown Prince on October 29, 1962.