Kuwait on High Alert After High School Exam Paper Leak
Kuwait’s education and security authorities are intensifying efforts to identify and arrest suspects involved in the leak of a crucial high school exam paper earlier this week.
The Kuwaiti Ministry of Education cancelled the Islamic education exam on Monday after its questions and answers circulated on social media.
The new test is now rescheduled for June 10. In response to the leak, Minister of Education Adel Al Adwani terminated the mandate of a team responsible for printing the examination papers, as reported by Kuwaiti newspaper Al Qabas, citing an education source.
Following the leak, senior education officials visited the exam paper printing house to verify the leak and decided to postpone the Islamic education test.
“There will be more measures to ensure exams will proceed without any new negative phenomena,” the source said without elaborating. Exam leaks have been reported in Kuwait in recent years, with culprits penalised in various cases.
Last month, a Kuwaiti court sentenced three defendants, including an expatriate, to five years in prison each for involvement in a high school examination leak.
Two Kuwaiti citizens were convicted of leaking exams via WhatsApp groups in exchange for money, and an Egyptian expatriate, tried in absentia, received the same sentence. In December, a Kuwaiti court issued varying jail terms to four individuals in a similar case.
The Criminal Court sentenced two Kuwaitis, a man and a woman, to 10 and seven years in prison, respectively. Another Kuwaiti man and an expatriate were each given one year in jail. Last November, a Kuwaiti court sentenced a citizen and an expatriate to 10 years in prison each for their involvement in the online leak of high school exams. The court also ordered both defendants to pay a combined fine of KD 482,000.
