A Kuwaiti court has sentenced seven men to death, five of them in absentia, for their roles in the deadly bombing of a Shia mosque that was claimed by Islamic State.
Twenty-nine defendants, 22 mean and seven women, had been on trial on charges of helping a Saudi suicide bomber carry out the 26 June attack, in which 26 people were killed and 227 injured.
“The court draws attention to the dangers of this extremist ideology that resorts to terrorism for its implementation,” the judge, Mohammad al-Duaij, said before reading out the verdicts to a packed courtroom on Tuesday.
He called on authorities to root out the ideology of the jihadis.
Among those sentenced to death was Abdul Rahman Sabah Saud, a stateless Arab convicted of driving the bomber to the mosque and transporting the explosives belt used in the attack from near the Saudi border.
During the trial, Saud confessed to dropping off the bomber but said he had been assured that the plan was to blow up the mosque without causing casualties.
The second man sentenced to death was Fahad Farraj Muhareb, described by the court as the wali, or local leader, of of Isis.
The other five, who remain at large, include two Saudi brothers, Mohammad and Majed al-Zahrani, who were convicted in absentia of smuggling the explosives used in the attack from Saudi Arabia in an icebox.
Saudi authorities arrested the two men days after the attack.
The other three include two stateless Arabs convicted of fighting with Isis and one defendant whose identity has not been established.The court also sentenced eight people, ive women and three men, to jail terms ranging from two to 15 years for providing weapons training, abetting the attack or knowing about it and failing to inform authorities.
The court acquitted 14 defendants, including two women. Eleven had been released during the trial.
Among those acquitted was Jarrah Nimer, the owner of the car used to drop off the bomber.
There was tight security for the hearing, with armoured vehicles deployed outside the Kuwait City court complex and helicopters patrolling overhead.
Including those still at large, seven Kuwaitis, five Saudis, three Pakistanis, 13 stateless Arabs and the unidentified fugitive were on trial.
An Isis-affiliated group calling itself Najd Province claimed responsibility for the Kuwait City bombing and suicide attacks at two Shia mosques in Saudi Arabia in May.