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Would-be immigrants end protest at Iraqi border |
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October 9, 2000
KUWAIT (AP) - After a five-day protest demanding entry to Kuwait, hundreds of people camped out on the Iraqi side of the border have dismantled their tents and left the area, a U.N. official said Sunday. The protest ended Saturday morning, when the last 200 people took down their tents and left the border in buses, Rijal said. The numbers had been dwindling from a high of more than 500 on Thursday. "Everything is back to normal. It's all bare. They're all gone," said Abdillahi Z. Rijal, a spokesman for the U.N. observer force that monitors the demilitarized zone along the Iraqi-Kuwaiti border. Kuwait maintains the immigrants were Iraqi security agents dressed in civilian clothes. It says they had been sleeping in military tents and using vehicles with Iraqi government registration plates. Rijal could not confirm the Kuwaiti claims, but said the group did include women and children. The would-be immigrants maintained they are stateless persons who previously had lived in Kuwait and wished to return. "Bidouns" - from the Arabic phrase "bidoun jinsiya," or without citizenship - long have been a political issue in Kuwait. The government says many are illegal immigrants seeking a better life in the oil-rich emirate. In May, parliament passed a bill enabling some to claim citizenship, however it limited naturalizations to 2,000 a year. Most bidouns in Kuwait have been denied work permits and live in poverty. |