France Press

KUWAIT CITY: Kuwait has allowed pan-Arab news channel Al-Jazeera to reopen its office in the Gulf state more than a year after ordering its closure, the television network's Kuwait director said Thursday.

"We received the official clearance to operate normally on Wednesday," Saad al-Saeedi told AFP.
The Al-Jazeera office was closed and the accreditation of its reporters withdrawn in December 2010 over the channel's coverage of a police crackdown on a public gathering that involved beating of several MPs.

Its reopening comes a week ahead of general polls in Kuwait described by many candidates as the most crucial in the oil-rich emirate's history.
The Al-Jazeera office was previously closed for three years from November 2002, reopening only after a visit by Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani.

Owned by Qatar's ruling family, Al-Jazeera was launched in 1996, broadcasting into the homes of millions of Arabs that until then relied primarily on state-run channels for news.
It has maintained an antagonistic relationship with most Arab regimes and, as a result, has had its offices shut down, its bureaus ransacked, its journalists arrested and its signals jammed.