Kuwait expands death penalties for drug trafficking and repeat offences

Kuwait expanded capital punishment for drug trafficking in 1995. A contemporary Philippine government notice warned workers leaving for Kuwait that the new penalties included mandatory death for repeat drug offences, including smuggling and growing drug plants. It reported that the change had taken effect in August.^[1]

Parliament had rejected an earlier proposal

The change followed an unsuccessful proposal in 1994. Amnesty International reported that a bill extending death penalties passed its first parliamentary reading but failed to gain a majority at the second.^[2]

That proposal would have made death an option for importing or manufacturing drugs for commercial purposes and for growing drug-producing plants. It also proposed mandatory death in specified aggravated cases. The parliamentary disagreement preceded the broader penalties adopted the following year.^[2]

The later law raised the stakes for traffickers

Kuwait’s Interior Ministry identifies the 1995 amendment as a step that increased punishment for drug importation to death. Its account places the change after the country’s separate 1983 narcotics and 1987 psychotropic-substance laws.^[3]

The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration circulated its warning as part of travel advice and departure briefings. It asked officials to tell workers about the harsher penalties before they travelled, showing how the change also became a concern for people entering Kuwait for employment.^[1]

Harsher penalties could not be backdated

Kuwait’s judicial training institute reproduces a Court of Cassation ruling about the amendment’s timing. The court said the law’s three-month transition mattered: the new rules could apply only to conduct after that period had expired.^[4]

In the case discussed, importing drugs for personal consumption fell under the earlier maximum of five years. The court upheld the legal basis for a suspended two-year sentence under the older rule. The example shows why the applicable law depended on when the offence occurred.^[4]

A combined statute later retained capital penalties

The 2025 replacement drug law brought narcotics and psychotropic substances into one statute. It retained death or life imprisonment for specified trafficking conduct, with separate penalties for personal use and unpaid supply.^[5]

The Kuwait profile explains those later rules. The 1995 change remains a major point in the history because it widened the circumstances in which drug offenders could face execution.