A Kuwaiti court on Tuesday sentenced seven suspects to death over a suicide bombing at a Shi'ite Muslim mosque in June that killed 27 people, state news agency KUNA reported.

The agency said the Kuwait criminal court also gave eight other suspects prison sentences ranging from two to 15 years. The court acquitted 14 other defendants.

The attack took place at a packed Shi'ite Muslim mosque in Kuwait city during Friday prayers.

It was the first suicide bombing attack on a Shi'ite mosque in the small Gulf Arab oil exporter, where Sunnis and Shi'ites live side by side with little apparent friction.

Kuwaiti parliament member Khalil al-Salih said worshippers were kneeling in prayer when a suicide bomber walked into the Imam al-Sadeq Mosque side and blew himself up, destroying walls and the ceiling.

"It was obvious from the suicide bomber's body that he was young. He walked into the prayer hall during sujood [kneeling in prayer], he looked ...in his 20s, I saw him with my own eyes," he told Reuters by telephone.