Mysterious Blast Rocks Kuwait Before Summit

Another mysterious explosion has shaken Kuwait just days before the opening of a meeting of Muslim leaders, officials acknowledged Thursday.

An official of the Ministry of Defense was quoted by the Kuwait News Agency as saying the blast was due to a “shell” that landed in an uninhabited area of Failaka Island, about 20 miles off the city of Kuwait in the Persian Gulf.

The news agency said there were no casualties or damage in the explosion, the sound of which rumbled through the capital around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The blast followed fires at three key Kuwaiti oil installations Monday night. While Kuwaiti officials ruled out sabotage as a cause of the fires, Western diplomats said the three blazes were touched off by four closely timed bomb explosions set by terrorists believed to be loyal to Iran.

The Iranian government, citing Kuwait’s support for Iraq in the six-year-old Persian Gulf War, has sharply criticized Kuwait’s plans to host the Organization of the Islamic Conference summit, due to begin Monday, and has refused to participate.

One diplomat expressed amazement at the Kuwaiti report of a shell landing on Failaka Island, which is inhabited and is a popular tourist site. The diplomat said that since the island is so far away from the Iran-Iraq War zone, a shell falling there would mean that the island had come under naval attack, presumably by Iran.

The government has opened an official inquiry into the sources of the Monday night fires in an offshore oil-loading installation and two onshore facilities.

Citing the Kuwaiti government’s ruling out of sabotage in the fires, Western diplomats said the Kuwaitis are concerned about scaring away heads of state who have planned to attend the Islamic summit. The Kuwaitis are preparing massive security for the meeting.

In advance of the summit, foreign ministers of the Arab world convened here Thursday, with the host country calling on Muslim nations to take action to suppress terrorism and end the Iran-Iraq War.

The ministers are to prepare an agenda for the heads-of-state gathering, which is expected to be dominated by the war. The rumble of Iranian heavy artillery firing at the southern Iraqi port of Basra can sometimes be heard here at night.

In Beirut, a group calling itself the “Revolutionary Organization--Forces of the Prophet Mohammed in Kuwait” claimed responsibility for setting the fires in the Kuwaiti oil installations.

A number of pro-Iranian groups have threatened Kuwait with terrorism if the conference goes ahead as planned. Despite the threats, Kuwait said it is expecting 27 heads of state to attend from the Arab world and other Muslim countries such as Pakistan and Indonesia. India will also be represented.