Court in Kuwait rules female MPs are free to discard hijab

28.10.09, GUARDIAN (UK). Kuwait's highest court has ruled today that female politicians are not obliged by law to wear the hijab, a blow to Muslim fundamentalists who want to fully impose sharia law. The constitutional court dismissed a voter's claim that two of the four women elected to parliament in May could not become members of the legislature because they did not wear the head covering. The five-judge panel ruled that election law was neither well-defined nor "specific" to the dress code, and stressed that the country's 1962 constitution guarantees personal freedoms and freedom of religion.