KUWAIT CITY \u2014 Parliament on Tuesday rejected a demand by a Shiite MP to question the foreign minister over Kuwait’s participation in Saudi-led airstrikes against Shiite Huthi rebels in Yemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A majority of lawmakers approved Foreign Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Sabah’s stand that questioning on the Yemen war would breach the constitution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Forty-five MPs voted in favor, nine against while two abstained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lawmakers who backed the move said that declaring war is a sovereign issue decided by the emir.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, parliament accepted a motion to hold the questioning behind closed doors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But MP Abdulhameed Dashti, who made the initial request for the grilling, walked out in protest saying the move was unconstitutional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaker Marzouk al-Ghanem then removed the grilling from the agenda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since March 26, a Saudi-led coalition has been carrying out airstrikes against the Huthis and forces loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh after they overran large parts of Yemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are just seven Shiite MPs in Kuwait’s 50-seat parliament, while Shiites constitute around a third of the 1.3 million native Kuwaitis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dashti is an outspoken critic of the Sunni-ruled Gulf state of Bahrain over its alleged mistreatment of majority Shiites, and also of Saudi Arabia for having sent troops to Manama.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He currently faces two criminal investigations, instigated by the foreign ministry, for allegedly endangering diplomatic ties with both Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Along with Kuwait, all are members of the Gulf Cooperation Council which also includes Oman, Qatar and United Arab Emirates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Oman is the only GCC member not taking part in the Saudi-led coalition waging the Yemen air war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Parliament on Tuesday rejected a demand by a Shiite MP to question the foreign minister over Kuwait’s participation in Saudi-led airstrikes against Shiite Huthi rebels in Yemen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":44281,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":47,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[11,33,47],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2793],"class_list":["post-21571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-global","category-home","category-mideast-africa"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"MZUDDPI36ZDA3CQTPIAMH57IIY","arc_canonical_url":"\/global\/mideast-africa\/2015\/05\/19\/kuwait-mps-reject-debate-over-yemen-war\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n