Kuwaiti chief editor women killed
Kuwait, Local, 3/21/2001

The Kuwaiti official news Agency said on Tuesday that the Kuwaiti media woman and renowned journalist Hedaya Sultan al-Salem was killed on Tuesday in Kuwait after an unidentified person killed here in her car in " Damascus street" in the Capital Kuwait.

Her assassination is considered by the Kuwaiti circles as the most dangerous crime against a Kuwaiti journalist following the assassination attempt of chief editor of the Kuwaiti daily al-Seyasah Ahmad al-Jarullah in the 1980s during which he was strongly wounded.

Stories told about al-Salem's assassination have been contradicted, but the incident has actually happened just days after she wrote articles in " al-Majales" magazine in one of them she addressed the ruler on Kuwait Sheikh jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah that she has been harassed by security sides and that she has become afraid about her life.

Sources at the Kuwaiti " media street" expected that there are personal reasons behind this crime and that she used to suffer financial problems and because of that she used to have frequent visits to courts. Until Tuesday evening, the Kuwaiti ministry of the Interior did not give any details about the crime.

Officials at the ministry said that clarification on this incident will be released after the completion of the investigation.

It was learnt that the Kuwaiti ministry of the Interior assigned best of its officers to follow up the investigations.

Special sources in Kuwaiti told the London- based al-Hayat daily in its today's issue that the assassination which claimed Hedaya's life and whose reasons are not known yet took place at 9 a.m. at " Damascus street" when hedaya left her house at al-Surra quarters and she rode her car with one of her relatives. She was interrupted by unidentified persons in a " Patrol" Jeep of golden color. One of them open a stream of bullets at her and she was hit by six bullets and was taken to the " Mubarak al-Kabir" to receive medical treatment but she died there.

Certain sources reported that an officer at the ministry of the interior called ( M. A) said to be the owner of the car which carried out the assassination. This officer strongly denied any relation to this incident. Four of his brothers were brought over the possibility that one of them had used the care. The five men were brought before an eye witness who was accompanying the killed woman and he ruled out any connection for them to this matter. The sources said that Hadaya's escort described the killer to the police as " of fair moustaches and of a light beard and that he can recognize among one thousand of men.

Hedaya ( 70 year old) has strong friendship relations with certain members of the ruling family in Kuwait and she has kinship from her mother's side with one of the branches of this royal family.

In the recent issue of "al-Majales " she wrote articles of clear " bitterness " over what she had considered harassment and bad intentions by sides which she did not clearly indicated, but she said that a series of theft and destruction incidents took place in her press establishment.

She, in her articles also criticized al-Badoun ( those who are Bedouins and they do not have the Kuwaiti nationality), al-Wafidoon ( people who come from various parts of the world to work in Kuwait) and the Egyptian ambassador in Kuwait.

The building of al-Majaled magazine was close off following the incident while the Kuwaiti journalists association issued a statement condemning " the ugly assassination incident which is unfamiliar for the Kuwaiti Society."

However. Hedaya al-Salem started her career as a journalist in 1961 with the beginning of the release of Kuwaiti papers and magazines. In 1970 she was the first woman to be the chief editor of a Kuwaiti news bulletin after she bought al-Majales magazine which used then to be published in Lebanon. Hedaya Sultan al-Salem is the daughter of Sultan al-Salem, the elder brother of Sheikh Fahd al-Salem al-Sabah from the side of his mother.

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