Kuwait: A suicide bomber who carried out a deadly attack claimed by the Islamic State group on a Shiite mosque in Kuwait was a Saudi national, the interior ministry said Sunday.
In a statement carried by the official KUNA news agency, the ministry identified the attacker as Fahd Suleiman Abdulmohsen al-Qaba’a. The ministry said that Qaba’a entered the country through Kuwait Airport at dawn on Friday, the same day of the bombing.
IS claimed the attack, which killed 26 and wounded 227 worshippers at the Al-Imam Al-Sadeq mosque in Kuwait City.
The ministry statement provided no further details about the bomber. Earlier on Sunday, the ministry said that security services arrested the driver of the car that transported the bomber to the site of the attack.
Authorities have also detained the owner of the house where the bomber was staying. He was described by the interior ministry as a Kuwaiti national who subscribes to “extremist and deviant ideology”.
The driver, named as Abdulrahman Sabah Eidan Saud, was described as an “illegal resident” born in 1989.
Authorities on Saturday arrested the owner of the car, Jarrah Nimr Mejbil Ghazi, born in 1988, and also listed as a stateless person.
The interior ministry said the driver of the Japanese-made car, who left the mosque immediately after the bombing, was an illegal resident named Abdul-Rahman Sabah Aidan, Kuna reported.
The ministry said Aidan, 26, was found hiding in one a house in the al-Riqqa residential area. “Initial investigations showed that the owner of the house is a supporter of the deviant thinking,” it said, adding that the owner of the house is a Kuwaiti citizen. The term “deviant” is often used by authorities in the Gulf region to refer to al Qaeda Islamist militants.
Kuwait holds mass funeral for mosque attack victims
Thousands of people in Kuwait have taken part in a mass funeral procession for 27 people killed in a suicide bombing that targeted a Shia mosque on Friday.
A day of mourning was declared in Kuwait on Saturday following the attack on the Imam Sadiq mosque in the district of Sawaber, in the eastern part of Kuwait City. Police said they were questioning a number of suspects with possible links to the suicide bombing.
