Influential voice in Middle East

Kuwait’s emir, Sheik Sabah al-ahmad al-jaber al-sabah, who used his influence as the country’s top diplomat to help shape the U. S.- led war against Iraqi occupiers in 1991 and then, as ruler, oversaw warming ties with Baghdad, has died at 91.

His death leaves the bloc of Western- allied Persian Gulf Arab states without one of its most experienced elder statesmen, at a time when they are deeply divided. But the leadership transition is unlikely to herald any immediate shifts for Kuwait, one of OPEC’S founding members.

Sabah directed Kuwait’s government- in- exile during the nine- month occupation by Iraqi forces in 1990-91.

“When the Iraqis invaded, we were in shock,” Sabah said in 1990. “Then we got organized.”

Sabah was born in Kuwait City on June 16, 1929. Nearly a decade would pass before oil was discovered in Kuwait, transforming a once-modest port into the region’s first petro boomtown.

He was named foreign minister in 1963 after holding a number of other government posts. He held that position for four decades. Over the years, he was also prime minister and acting interior minister.

Sabah’s rise spanned a golden era for Kuwait. In the 1970s, Kuwait was a leader in the Arab world on many fronts.

Its elected parliament, relatively open media and liberal views on women in public life were seen as trail- blazing. Kuwait University attracted students from across the Middle East and beyond, and the country offered a haven for activists and writers persecuted in other Arab states.

But Sabah also had to represent Kuwait during rocky times, including the 1973-74 Arab oil embargo and the devastating Iran-iraq War in the 1980s.

Sabah’s role was transformed by the August 1990 invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein’s forces.

He mobilized the technology of the day — faxes, telex and the emerging mobile- phone systems — to stitch together a network of Kuwaiti diplomats, activists and backers around the world.

Sabah was suddenly one of Kuwait’s most prominent and well-connected officials, appealing for international support to lead a war to uproot the Iraqis.

The 1991 war left Kuwait as a hub for U. S. military forces in the Gulf. The 9/ 11 attacks raised Kuwait’s profile as a U. S. military staging ground.

At home, he faced Islamists demanding stricter attention to sharia codes and liberals complaining that crackdowns on dissent threatened Kuwait’s openness.

Sabah’s wife, Fatuwah bint Salman, died in 1990. He lived for years in a palace known as Dar Salwa, named after his daughter, Salwa, who died of cancer in 2002. He also had two sons.