Women went to the polls today for the first time in Kuwait, voting for parliament members in an election that has shaken up politics-as-usual in the conservative oil-rich emirate.

Women went to the polls for the first time in Kuwait, voting for parliament members in an election that has shaken up politics-as-usual in the conservative oil-rich emirate.

Candidates in today’s Kuwaiti elections – the first with women participants - made a final pitch for voters to endorse electoral reform, the issue that caused the emir to dissolve parliament last month.

The former Iranian president said today that talk of US contingency planning for a military attack on Iran was overblown because such a move would be too dangerous.

Kuwait’s state-supported supermarkets today announced a boycott of Danish products, and the Foreign Ministry called in a regional Danish ambassador to protest at caricatures in a Danish newspaper that have been deemed insulting to Islam’s prophet.

The unprecedented shake-up in Kuwait’s ruling family should not effect the tiny, oil-rich country’s close ties to Washington, but analysts said tonight there could be significant changes in Kuwait, such as the imposition of taxes.

Kuwaitis waited today for the expected abdication of their ailing emir, Sheikh Saad Al Abdullah Al Sabah, a move that has been sought for days to resolve the country’s unprecedented leadership crisis.

The emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Jaber Al Ahmed Al Sabah, who was forced into months of exile by Iraqi forces overrunning his oil-rich Gulf state in 1990 and then supported the US in invading Iraq more than a decade later, died today.

Donations to Hurricane Katrina relief poured in from around the world, with Kuwait offering $500m (€397.4m) and other Mideast countries offering aid and condolences despite widespread opposition to US policies in the area.

Following a series of incidents along the Kuwaiti border, Iraqi legislators today accused Kuwait of stealing their oil as well as chipping away some of their national territory.

A rapid series of car bombs and another blast ripped through a luxury hotel and a coffee shop in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheik today, killing at least 75, police said.

Iraq and Iran have issued a joint statement blaming Saddam Hussein and his henchmen for being the military aggressors in the 1980-88 war between both countries and Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

Parliament today approved women’s political rights, clearing the way for women to run in parliamentary elections for the first time in Kuwait’s history.

Political wrangling is threatening to derail the fight by Kuwaiti women for greater political rights in the conservative Gulf state ahead of a crucial parliamentary session today on allowing females to participate in municipal elections for the first time.

Director Michael Moore's film Fahrenheit 9/11 has been banned by American ally Kuwait, because of its controversial representation of the Saudi Arabian royal family.

Kuwait, a major US ally in the Gulf, has banned Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11” because it deems the movie insulting to the Saudi Arabian royal family and critical of America’s invasion of Iraq, an official said today.

A DEFIANT Saddam Hussein rejected charges of war crimes and genocide in a court appearance in Baghdad yesterday, telling a judge "this is all theatre, the real criminal is Bush".

A defiant Saddam Hussein rejected charges of war crimes and genocide in a court appearance in Baghdad today, telling a judge “this is all theatre, the real criminal is Bush”.

A criminal court today convicted seven Kuwaiti Islamic extremists of involvement in the 2002 shooting attack on US Marines that killed one and injured another.

US aircraft destroyed a Baghdad office of a radical Shiite cleric, killing two people and injuring six, his followers said today.

The FBI is to join the investigation into the Najaf mosque bombing after the provincial governor called for US help over the explosion at Iraq’s holiest Shiite Muslim shrine that killed 125 people.

BEATING their chests and calling for revenge, more than 300,000 Muslims began a two-day, 110-mile march yesterday to the holy city of Najaf to mourn a cherished Shi'ite leader assassinated in a car bombing.

More than 300,000 Muslims began a two-day, 110-mile march to the holy city of Najaf today to mourn the Shiite leader assassinated in a car bombing that killed at least 85 people.

A FOREIGN security guard and two Iraqis were killed in a second day of violence in Basra yesterday in which British troops fired warning shots as crowds attacked vehicles and blocked streets with burning tires.

The first sizeable relief convoy set out for Iraq in a biting sandstorm today as allied forces struggled to clear the way for more aid shipments, using dolphins to remove mines from waterways and hunting Iraqi fighters around the port of Umm Qasr.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last night outlined eight objectives pursued

BITTER enmity between Iraq and Kuwait erupted in a vitriolic name-calling match yesterday at an Islamic summit meant to unite the voices of the world’s one billion Muslims against war.

KUWAIT yesterday said it had arrested three of its nationals planning to launch a terrorist attack against US troops in the emirate and seized weapons and ammunition in their possession.

Three Kuwaitis have been arrested on suspicion of planning terrorist attacks on US forces in the country.

Hundreds of Kuwaitis evacuated their offices to the accompaniment of fiery explosions today as the Gulf emirate staged a mock Iraqi attack to prepare for any lashing out from its unpredictable neighbour.

Saddam Hussein this evening apologised for his 1990 invasion of Kuwait, as he handed over a dossier detailing Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological activities.

Two Kuwaitis who attacked US marines were not acting alone and one headed a group that was planning more assaults on Americans, an Kuwaiti Interior Ministry official said today.

A US marine who survived what Kuwait called a “terrorist act” was recovering today as investigators studied how two attackers infiltrated military exercises off the emirate’s coast.

Two Kuwaitis shot at US Marines during war games on an island off the Gulf state today, killing one and wounding another in what the Kuwaiti government called a terrorist act. Fellow Marines shot dead the assailants.

Iraq’s foreign minister and the UN secretary-general agreed that their first high-level talks in a year got off to a ‘‘positive and constructive’’ start, but there was no sign Iraq would allow UN weapons inspectors back in the country.