Kuwait High Court Rejects Challenge To Election of Women MPs Who Refuse To Wear Hijab

Kuwait's Constitutional Court-- the country's highest tribunal-- today rejected an attempt by four voters to invalidate the election of two women members of Parliament. AFP reported on the decision. Petitioners argued that because the two women refused to wear the hijab (headscarf), they were in violation of a provision in the election law requiring candidates to comply with Islamic religious requirements. The Court however said that the election law does not specify which sharia regulations candidates must follow, and at any rate the guarantees in the Kuwaiti Constitution for equality, personal liberty, and freedom of belief and religion supersede anything to the contrary in the election law. (See prior related posting.)