Kuwait activists stage protest against book banning

Kuwait: Around 80 activists gathered in Irada Square opposite the National Assembly yesterday to protest against the banning of books by the information ministry, Kuwait Times daily has reported.

There was an earlier protest gathering of the kind in front of the Information ministry on 1 September. Dr Fatima Al-Matar, a teacher at the Faculty of Law of Kuwait University, criticized the arbitrary resolutions of the information ministry to ban books. “We came today to say no to banning books and no to restricting free thinking and freedom. We will protest against the arbitrariness of the ministry. We previously met the minister who gave us many promises including changing the censorship committee and amending the publications law, particularly articles 7 and 21, which deal with banning books. We demanded post-censorship instead of pre-censorship – the same way newspapers are treated, for instance,” Kuwait Times quoted her as telling the paper.

The ministry has banned 4,570 books from being sold in Kuwait in the past few years. “Books are an essential and basic right of people, and we do not agree with the bans. We will continue protesting until the promises of the minister are fulfilled. Although some people don’t care much for the ban as they believe they can buy these books online, I think those who censored these books can also ban the import of these books or block the websites selling them. I know a person who wanted to import a number of books for his personal use but was not allowed to collect them from the customs,” Matar said.