Kuwait court commutes four Qaeda death sentences

KUWAIT, June 19 (Reuters) Kuwait's highest court today commuted death sentences passed on four militants suspected of links with al Qaeda to life imprisonment.

A court ruling read out to reporters also confirmed life sentences for two other militants.

The four militants had appealed against death sentences handed down by a criminal court in 2005 for bloody attacks in the Gulf Arab state, a staunch US ally.

An appealed court had confirmed the death sentences in 2006.

The court named the four as Mohammad Saad Ali bin Noun, Abdullah Saeed Habib al-Shimmari, Saleh Abdallah Rabia Khalaf and Mohammad Issa Nawaf al-Shimmari.

The militants were convicted for their part in clashes with police in 2005, in which four security officers and nine militants were killed.

They were convicted of charges including belonging to an ''extremist'' group, calling for attacks on state facilities, and trying to kill Kuwaiti security officers as well as members of ''friendly forces'' in the major oil producer, which hosts thousands of US troops.

The defendants were among 37 Islamists on trial as members of the group calling itself Peninsula Lions, which is suspected of having links to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network. The only woman among them has since died after being treated for cancer.

Seven defendants have been acquitted, while others were handed prison sentences in previous rulings.

They include 25 Kuwaitis, seven stateless Arabs, two Jordanians, a Saudi, an Australian and a Somali.

Kuwait has cracked down on Islamists opposing the US military presence there.

REUTERS PY RAI2135