Visa policy of Kuwait
Visitors to Kuwait must obtain a visa unless they come from one of the visa exempt countries or countries eligible for visa on arrival/eVisa. All visitors except GCC citizens must hold a passport valid for 6 months. Citizens of the following countries do not require a visa to visit Kuwait and may use National ID Cards to enter the country: Nationals of China holding normal passports endorsed for public affairs do not require a visa. Holders of diplomatic or official passports of Albania, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, China, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Mongolia, Pakistan, Philippines, Romania, Serbia, South Korea, Tajikistan, Ukraine, United Kingdom and Vietnam and just diplomatic passports of Armenia, Greece, Iraq, Poland and Uzbekistan do not require a visa. Citizens of the following 54 countries and territories may obtain a visa valid for 3 months on arrival to Kuwait if arriving by air or they may obtain an eVisa before arrival: 1-Can only obtain Visa on arrival, not eVisa 2-Can only obtain eVisa, not Visa on arrival Visa can be obtained on arrival valid for one month for those holding a confirmation from a transporting carrier and are travelling for tourism purposes.
Passengers arriving by sea or land must obtain visa in advance. Residents of GCC countries belonging to designated professions may obtain a visa online. Nationals of Ethiopia are banned from entering Kuwait. From 2011 until at least 2014, Kuwait banned entry from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Yemen. In May 2016, Kuwait put a temporary visa ban on religious personalities deemed "controversial", while planning to limit visits by people from specific countries to Kuwait during Ramadan the Syrians, Jordanians and Yemenis, according to Al-Rai daily. After President of the United States Donald Trump's Executive Order 13769 which barred the nationals of Afghanistan, Iran, Yemen and Libya, several news sites published stories about a similar ban. Kuwait's Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied that they ban travel from those countries, the Kuwaiti Ministry has a history of denying any such bans on these particular countries, instead claiming "restrictions" on nationals who are never granted visas. Additionally entry and transit is refused to Israeli citizens.
Visa requirements for Kuwaiti citizens List of countries whose citizens can obtain Visas upon arrival at all Kuwaiti ports of entry, Embassy of the State of Kuwait - Washington, DC
History of Kuwait
Kuwait is a country in the Arabian Peninsula, surrounding the Gulf of Kuwait at the head of the Persian Gulf. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Kuwait was a prosperous trade port. During the Ubaid period, Kuwait was the central site of interaction between the peoples of Mesopotamia and Neolithic Eastern Arabia centered in As-Subiya in northern Kuwait; the earliest evidence of human habitation in Kuwait dates back 8000 B. C. where Mesolithic tools were found in Burgan. As-Subiya in northern Kuwait is the earliest evidence of urbanization in the whole Persian Gulf basin area. Mesopotamians first settled in the Kuwaiti island of Failaka in 2000 B. C. Traders from the Sumerian city of Ur ran a mercantile business; the island had many Mesopotamian-style buildings typical of those found in Iraq dating from around 2000 B. C; the Neolithic inhabitants of Kuwait were among the world's earliest maritime traders. One of the world's earliest reed-boats was discovered in northern Kuwait dating back to the Ubaid period.
The earliest recorded mention of Kuwait was in 150 AD in the geographical treatise Geography by Greek scholar Ptolemy. Ptolemy mentioned the Bay of Kuwait as Hieros Kolpos. In 4000 BC until 2000 BC, the bay of Kuwait was home to the Dilmun civilization. Dilmun's control of the bay of Kuwait included Kuwait City's Shuwaikh Port, Umm an Namil Island and Failaka island. At its peak in 2000 BC, the Dilmun empire controlled the trade routes from Mesopotamia to India and the Indus Valley civilization. Dilmun's commercial power began to decline after 1800 BC. Piracy flourished throughout the region during Dilmun's decline. After 600 BC, the Babylonians added Dilmun to their empire. In 4th century BC, the ancient Greeks colonized the bay of Kuwait under Alexander the Great, the ancient Greeks named mainland Kuwait Larissa and Failaka was named Ikaros. According to Strabo and Arrian, Alexander the Great named Failaka Ikaros because it resembled the Aegean island of that name in size and shape. Remains of Greek colonization include Greek temples.
In 224 AD, Kuwait became part of the Sassanid Empire. At the time of the Sassanid Empire, Kuwait was known as Meshan, an alternative name of the kingdom of Characene. Akkaz was a Partho-Sassanian site. In 636 AD, the Battle of Chains between the Sassanid Empire and Rashidun Caliphate was fought in Kuwait near the town of Kazma. At the time, Kuwait was under the control of the Sassanid Empire; the Battle of Chains was the first battle of the Rashidun Caliphate in which the Muslim army sought to extend its frontiers. As a result of Rashidun victory in 636 AD, the bay of Kuwait was home to a city known as "Kadhima" or "Kāzimah" in the early Islamic era. Medieval Arabic sources contain multiple references to the bay of Kuwait in the early Islamic period; the city functioned as a trade port and resting place for pilgrims on their way from Iraq to Hejaz. The city was controlled by the kingdom of Al-Hirah in Iraq. In the early Islamic period, the bay of Kuwait was known for being a fertile area; the city was a stop for caravans coming from Persia and Mesopotamia en route to the Arabian Peninsula.
The poet Al-Farazdaq was born in the city. Al-Farazdaq is recognized as one of the greatest classical poets of the Arabs. In 1521, Kuwait was under Portuguese control. In the late 16th century, the Portuguese built a defensive settlement in Kuwait. In 1613, the town of Kuwait was founded in the present-day location of Kuwait City. Kuwait was under the control of the Bani Khalid clan, who built a fishing village in present-day Kuwait Bay; the beginning of the eighteenth century witnessed the contention of Kuwait by the Bani Utub confederation. They migrated to Kuwait in 1682; as a result of successive matrimonial alliances, they were able to wrest control of Kuwait sometime after the death of Barrak Bin Urair and the fall of the Bani Khaled Emirate. The Al Jalahma and Al Khalifa families relocated to Zubarah in 1766, leaving the only remaining Utub of Al Sabah as sole proprietors of Kuwait. In the eighteenth century, Kuwait prospered and became the principal commercial center for the transit of goods between India, Muscat and Arabia.
By the mid 1700s, Kuwait had established itself as the major trading route from the Persian Gulf to Aleppo. During the Persian siege of Basra in 1775—1779, Iraqi merchants took refuge in Kuwait and were instrumental in the expansion of Kuwait's boat-building and trading activities; as a result, Kuwait's maritime commerce boomed. Between the years 1775 and 1779, the Indian trade routes with Baghdad, Aleppo and Constantinople were diverted to Kuwait; the East India Company was diverted to Kuwait in 1792. The East India Company secured the sea routes between Kuwait and the east coasts of Africa. After the Persians withdrew from Basra in 1779, Kuwait continued to attract trade away from Basra; the flight of many of Basra's leading merchants to Kuwait continued to play a significant role in Basra's commercial stagnation well into the 1850s. Regional geopolitical turbulence helped foster economic prosperity in Kuwait in the second half of the 18th century. Kuwait became prosperous due to Basra's instability in the late 18th century.
In the late 18th century, Kuwait functioned as a haven for Basra's merchants fleeing Ottoman government persecution. Kuwait was the center of boat building in the Persian Gulf region. Kuwaiti ship vessels were renowned throughout the Indian Ocean. Kuwaitis developed a reputation as the best sailors in the Persian Gulf. In the 19th century, Kuwait became significant in the horse trade, horses were shipped by the w
Bayan Palace
Bayan Palace is the main palace of the Emir of Kuwait. It is located in the Bayan area. Bayan Palace was opened in 1986 to host the fifth conference of the Arab League; the palace has an international conference centre attached. There is a 0.35 hectare Emiri tent within the palace grounds, erected in 1991 after the liberation of Kuwait
Heir apparent
An heir apparent or heiress apparent is a person, first in a line of succession and cannot be displaced from inheriting by the birth of another person. An heir presumptive, by contrast, is someone, first in line to inherit a title but who can be displaced by the birth of a more eligible heir. Today these terms most describe heirs to hereditary titles or offices when only inheritable by a single person. Most monarchies refer to the heir apparent of their thrones with the descriptive term of crown prince but these heirs may be accorded with a more specific substantive title, such as Prince of Orange in the Netherlands, Duke of Brabant in Belgium, Prince of Asturias in Spain, or Prince of Wales in the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms. In France the title was le Dauphin, in Imperial Russia; the term is used metaphorically to indicate an "anointed" successor to any position of power, e.g. a political or corporate leader. This article describes the term heir apparent in a hereditary system regulated by laws of primogeniture—as opposed to cases where a monarch has a say in naming the heir.
In a hereditary system governed by some form of primogeniture, an heir apparent is identifiable as the person whose position as first in the line of succession to a title or office is secure, regardless of future births. An heir presumptive, by contrast, can always be "bumped down" in the succession by the birth of somebody more related in a legal sense to the current title-holder; the clearest example occurs in the case of a holder of a hereditary title, one that can only be inherited by a single person, with no children. If at any time he were to produce children, they rank ahead of whatever more "distant" relative had been heir presumptive. Many legal systems assume childbirth is always possible regardless of health. In such circumstances a person may be, in a practical sense, the heir apparent but still speaking, heir presumptive. Indeed, when Queen Victoria succeeded her uncle King William IV, the wording of the proclamation gave as a caveat:...saving the rights of any issue of his late Majesty King William IV, which may be born of his late Majesty's consort.
This provided for the possibility that William's wife, Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, was pregnant at the moment of his death, since such a posthumous child, regardless of its sex, would have displaced Victoria from the throne. Adelaide was 44 at the time, so pregnancy was possible if unlikely. Daughters may inherit titles that descend according to male-preference primogeniture, but only in default of sons; that is, both female and male offspring have the right to a place somewhere in the order of succession, but when it comes to what that place is, a female will rank behind her brothers regardless of their ages or her age. Thus even an only daughter will not be heir apparent, since at any time a brother might be born who, though younger, would assume that position. Hence, she is an heir presumptive. For example, Queen Elizabeth II was heir presumptive during the reign of her father, King George VI, because at any stage up to his death, George could have fathered a legitimate son. In a system of absolute primogeniture that disregards gender, female heirs apparent occur.
As succession to titles, positions, or offices in the past most favoured males than females, females considered to be an heir apparent were rare. Absolute primogeniture was not practised by any modern monarchy for succession to their thrones until the late twentieth century with Sweden being the first to adopt absolute primogeniture in 1980 and other Western European monarchies following suit. Since the adoption of absolute primogeniture by contemporary Western European monarchies, examples of female heirs apparent include: Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden, Princess Catharina-Amalia of the Netherlands, Princess Elisabeth of Belgium. Princess Ingrid Alexandra of Norway is heir apparent to her father, Victoria herself has a female heir apparent in her oldest child, Princess Estelle. Victoria was not heir apparent from birth, but gained the status in 1980 following a change in the Swedish Act of Succession, her younger brother Carl Philip was thus heir apparent for a few months. In 2015, pursuant to the 2011 Perth Agreement, the Commonwealth realms changed the rules of succession to the 16 thrones of Elizabeth II to absolute primogeniture, except for male heirs born before the Perth Agreement.
The effects are not to be felt for many years. But in legal systems that apply male-preference primogeniture, female heirs apparent are by no means impossible: if a male heir apparent dies leaving no sons but at least one daughter the eldest daughter would replace her father as heir apparent to whatever throne or title is concerned, but only when it has become clear that the widow of the deceased is not pregnant; as the representative of her father's line she would assume a place ahead of any more distant relatives. Such a situation has not to date occurred with the British throne.
Monarch
A monarch is a sovereign head of state in a monarchy. A monarch may exercise the highest authority and power in the state, or others may wield that power on behalf of the monarch. A monarch either inherits the lawful right to exercise the state's sovereign rights or is selected by an established process from a family or cohort eligible to provide the nation's monarch. Alternatively, an individual may become monarch by acclamation or a combination of means. A monarch reigns for life or until abdication. If a young child is crowned the monarch, a regent is appointed to govern until the monarch reaches the requisite adult age to rule. Monarchs' actual powers vary from one monarchy in different eras. A monarch can reign in multiple monarchies simultaneously. For example, the monarchy of Canada and the monarchy of the United Kingdom are separate states, but they share the same monarch through personal union. Monarchs, as such, bear a variety of titles – king or queen, prince or princess, emperor or empress, duke or grand duke, emir or sultan.
Prince is sometimes used as a generic term to refer to any monarch regardless of title in older texts. A king can be a queen's husband and a queen can be a king's wife. If both of the couple reign, neither person is considered to be a consort. Monarchy is political or sociocultural in nature, is associated with hereditary rule. Most monarchs, both and in the present day, have been born and brought up within a royal family and trained for future duties. Different systems of succession have been used, such as proximity of blood, agnatic seniority, Salic law, etc. While traditionally most monarchs have been male, female monarchs have ruled, the term queen regnant refers to a ruling monarch, as distinct from a queen consort, the wife of a reigning king; some monarchies are non-hereditary. In an elective monarchy, the monarch otherwise serves as any other monarch. Historical examples of elective monarchy include the Holy Roman Emperors and the free election of kings of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
Modern examples include the Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia, appointed by the Conference of Rulers every five years or after the king's death, the pope of the Roman Catholic Church, who serves as sovereign of the Vatican City State and is elected to a life term by the College of Cardinals. In recent centuries, many states have become republics. Advocacy of government by a republic is called republicanism, while advocacy of monarchy is called monarchism. A principal advantage of hereditary monarchy is the immediate continuity of national leadership, as illustrated in the classic phrase "The King is dead. Long live the King!". In cases where the monarch serves as a ceremonial figure real leadership does not depend on the monarch. A form of government may in fact be hereditary without being considered monarchy, such as a family dictatorship. Monarchies take a wide variety of forms, such as the two co-princes of Andorra, positions held by the Roman Catholic Bishop of Urgel and the elected President of France.
The Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia is considered a monarch despite only holding the position for five years at a time. Hereditary succession within one patrilineal family has been most common, with preference for children over siblings, sons over daughters. In Europe, some peoples practiced equal division of land and regalian rights among sons or brothers, as in the Germanic states of the Holy Roman Empire, until after the medieval era and sometimes into the 19th century. Other European realms practice one form or another of primogeniture, whereunder a lord was succeeded by his eldest son or, if he had none, by his brother, his daughters or sons of daughters; the system of tanistry was semi-elective and gave weight to ability and merit. The Salic law, practiced in France and in the Italian territories of the House of Savoy, stipulated that only men could inherit the crown. In most fiefs, in the event of the demise of all legitimate male members of the patrilineage, a female of the family could succeed.
In most realms and sisters were eligible to succeed a ruling kinsman before more distant male relatives, but sometimes the husband of the heiress became the ruler, most also received the title, jure uxoris. Spain today continues this model of succession law, in the form of cognatic primogeniture. In more complex medieval cases, the sometimes conflicting principles of proximity and primogeniture battled, outcomes were idiosyncratic; as the average life span increased, an eldest son was more to reach majority age before the death of his father, primogeniture became favoured over proximity, tanistry and election. In 19
February 2012 Kuwaiti general election
Early general elections were held in Kuwait on 2 February 2012, the country's second general election in a three-year period. The election's turnout rate was 59%. However, in June 2012 Kuwait's Constitutional Court declared the elections invalid and reinstated the former parliament; the court said the dissolution of Parliament in December 2011 by Emir Sabah Al-Sabah was unconstitutional. In response, opposition MPs demanded a full parliamentary system. After the dissolution of parliament, a new election was set for December 2012. Emir Sabah Al-Sabah dissolved the National Assembly of Kuwait on 7 December 2011 citing "deteriorating conditions" amid an bitter political showdown over alleged high-level corruption. Major street demonstrations, some with crowds numbering in the tens of thousands, had been occurring with greater and greater frequency, forcing the resignation of the government for the second time in less than a year. A group of former government parliamentarians sued to reverse the dissolution, stating that the act was unconstitutional.
In response the decree to set the date for the new election was delayed. The election was set for 21 February. While operating within the Constitution of Kuwait, opposition candidates are demanding significant reforms, including a constitutional monarchy. Shiite candidate and ex-MP Hussein al-Qallaf accused the opposition of wanting to share power with the ruling family, which he said would lead Kuwait into a state of chaos. There were 344 candidates, including 24 women. According to some polls, the opposition may gain as many as 33 seats, up from the 20 seats they held before. Liberal bloc won 9 seats; the opposition bloc won 34 out of 50 seats in the parliament. The opposition bloc is a loose coalition of liberals, secular nationalists, tribes and a few Shiites. Sunni Islamists and tribes combined won 23 seats; the biggest margin of victory in each constituency was led by: Faisal al-Duwaisan with 14,094 votes. Jamaan al-Harbash with 8,475 votes. Faisal al-Mislem al-Otaibi with 16,383 votes. Musallam al-Barrak.
Falah al-Sawwagh
Demographics of Kuwait
This article is about the demographic features of the population of Kuwait. Expatriates account for around 70% of Kuwait's total population, with Kuwaitis constituting 28%–32% of the total population; the government and Kuwaiti citizens consider the proportion of expatriates to be a problem, in 2016 the number of deportations increased. Kuwait consists of six governorates: Hawalli, Farwaniyah, Jahra and Mubarak Al-Kabeer; some Kuwaiti people are foreigners. Kuwait consists of six governorates: Hawalli, Farwaniyah, Jahra and Mubarak Al-Kabeer. Most Kuwaitis live in the governorates of Hawalli and Farwaniyah; the biggest population difficulty in Kuwait involves the Bedoon, a stateless people numbering just over 100,000 who are classed as illegal residents and who are trying to claim Kuwaiti citizenship. Critics argue that these people are Arabs who migrated from Iraq and Saudi Arabia. In 2013, a law was passed to grant citizenship to 4,000 of these people as part of an attempt to resolve the problem.
However, the government has said that only a third of the Bedoon would qualify for possible naturalization as it considers that the rest hold other nationalities, with officials alleging that they have destroyed their documents in order to claim Kuwaiti citizenship. UN estimates Registered births and deaths Structure of the population: Source: UN World Population Prospects The following demographic statistics are from the CIA World Factbook, unless otherwise indicated. Age structure0–14 years: 25.8% 15–64 years: 72.2% 65 years and over: 2% Population growth rate1.986% Gender ratioat birth: 1.047 male/female under 15 years: 1.04 male/female 15–64 years: 1.79 male/female 65 years and over: 1.65 male/female total population: 1.54 male/female Life expectancy at birthtotal population: 77.09 years male: 75.95 years female: 78.3 years Total fertility rate2.64 children born/woman Nationalitynoun: Kuwaiti adjective: KuwaitiEthnic groups )Kuwaiti 28%, other Arab 27.9%, Asian 37.8%, African 1.9%, other 1.1% LanguagesArabic English spoken widelyReligionsMuslim 99% Christian 1% Other and Unspecified 0.2%Literacydefinition: age 15 and over can read and write total population: 94% Religion in Kuwait
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