The ministry named the attacker as “Fahd Sulaiman Abdul-Muhsin al-Qabbaa” and said that he had arrived in Kuwait by air earlier on the day of the attack.

Friday's suicide attack, claimed by the ISIS extremist group, was the first of its kind in the small Persian Gulf state where Shiites make up around 30 percent of the population, DPA reports.

State news agency Kuna said Saturday that police had held the owner of a car that drove the suicide bomber to the al-Imam Sadiq mosque in Kuwait City where the assailant blew himself up during Friday prayers.

The So-called “Islamic State”, which is active in Syria and Iraq, has also claimed responsibility for Friday's attack by a lone gunman on a Tunisian beach resort in which 38 people, almost all foreign tourists, were killed.

In recent months the extremist group has claimed responsibility for a series of attacks on Shiite mosques in Saudi Arabia and Yemen.

Kuwaiti mourners queue on 27 June, 2015 to give their condolences to the families of the victims of a suicide bombing which took place at Imam al-Sadeq mosque(PBUH) the previous day, in Kuwait City (AFP)