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Situation at Kuwait-Iraq Border Calm: Official
The situation along Kuwait's northern border with Iraq is calm, even though Baghdad has massed hundreds of Bedouins (stateless people) on the Iraqi side of the border, a senior Kuwaiti official said Wednesday.
Speaking to reporters, Interior Minister Sheikh Mohammad Khaled Al-Hamad Al-Sabah said, "security situation of the Kuwaiti-Iraqi borders was under control and the Kuwaiti forces along with the U.N. peacekeepers were handling the situation very efficiently."
Iraq has reportedly sent hundreds of families to its southern border areas near the demilitarized zone (DMZ), which was set up by the United Nations after the 1991 Gulf War which ended the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait.
The Iraqi stateless Arabs are staging a sit-in to press their claims to return to Kuwait.
Sheikh Mohammad, who is also acting defense minister, said there were 26,000 people who left Kuwait for Iraq voluntarily in 1991-1993, and Iraq officially closed the border in 1993.
Kuwait has refused to let these Bedouins cross the border into Kuwait, and has sent scores of its elite troops to the border areas to stop any bid to cross the frontier.
The Kuwait interior minister said the security forces had strict orders to deal with any attempt to violate the Kuwaiti borders. But he declined to elaborate on these orders.
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