Oman's ailing Sultan Qaboos bin Said, one of the Middle East's longest...
DUBAI/CAIRO - Oman’s ailing Sultan Qaboos bin Said, one of the Middle East’s longest serving rulers, died on Friday and the Gulf state’s high military council called on the ruling family to convene to choose a successor, state media said.
State news agency ONA did not give a cause of death, but Qaboos had been unwell for years and spent a week in Belgium undergoing medical treatment in early December. If the council fails to agree, a council of military and security officials, supreme court chiefs and heads of the two consultative assemblies will put in power the person whose name has been secretly written by the sultan in a sealed letter.
“But the wildcard is whether any of Oman’s neighbors might try to pressure the new sultan as he settles into power - just as the Saudis and Emiratis tried to pressure Emir Tamim in the weeks and months after he assumed power in Qatar in 2013.”Oman has long been to the Middle East what neutral Switzerland is to global diplomacy, balancing ties between two vast neighbors locked in a regional struggle, Saudi Arabia to the west and Iran to the north.
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