Kuwaiti women win 1st parliamentary seats, fundamentalists lose ground

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Four Kuwaitis have become the first women elected to their nation's parliament, a resounding victory in a conservative Persian Gulf country where the legislature has been men-only for almost half a century. Saturday's election was the outcome of one such confrontation, which prompted Kuwait's ruler, or emir, to dissolve parliament and call the vote, for a second time this year. One of the women elected, Massouma al-Mubarak, was also the country's first female Cabinet minister. The election results also showed fundamentalist Muslims losing ground. They won 16 seats on Saturday, down from the 24 seats they held in the previous house.