However, Kuwait has, in marked contrast to its neighbors, a climate of extensive religious tolerance. The latter allows no signs of public Christian worship. In Kuwait, by contrast, the two Islamic sects live side by side, and Christians practice openly. Relations with the outside world are now largely proper, but given the neighborhood, tense. The Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development, which distributed money widely before 1990 only to see many of its major recipients support Iraq, still declines to give aid to Jordan, Yemen and Sudan.
Aid goes instead to Bosnia and Albania.
But during my visit in December 1999 the Yemeni and Sudanese ambassadors arrived to present their credentials to the Amir. Relations with Britain and America are close, but there is nervousness about the intentions of future US presidential candidates and the fickleness of Western public opinion. Saudi Arabia is not universally regarded as a friend, either. The trauma of the 1990-91 war has intensified, rather than clarified, the tendency to geopolitical paranoia in these parts. Many a claim is made about the US encouragement of the invasion in August 1990.