Word: sultans
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Under Said Bin Taimur, the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman, which lies on the southeast corner of the Arabian peninsula, remained one of the most stagnant societies on earth. The 60-year-old Sultan decreed long ago that his 600,000 subjects should not own automobiles or attend cinemas. In the capital, Muscat, the city gates are closed at sundown, when the cannon booms. People must carry lanterns at night; flashlights are banned as too blinding...
Life imprisonment in Muscat means being dumped into a 30-ft. hole in the ground. When a British visitor recently complained that such treatment was harsh, the Sultan disagreed. "It is enlightened because the man does not live long enough to suffer much," he said...
...Sultan Said ruled with absolute power. He handled visa applications himself, and decided which of his subjects could hold jobs. His country's educational system consists of two primary schools because the Sultan felt that advanced Western education was unnecessary-and potentially dangerous to his regime. After the discovery of oil in 1964, he imported foreigners to fill technical jobs, but made no effort to train his own people...
...fact, the only subject for whom the Sultan provided a higher education was his son Qabus, whom he sent to Britain's Sandhurst Military Academy. Many Britons hoped that the Sultan would retire in favor of his son, but Said showed no such inclination. Once back home Qabus found himself under virtual palace arrest at Salala; he was forbidden to marry or even to receive guests without his father's permission...
...influenza; in Paris. Catroux led troops during the conquests in North Africa, the Middle East and Indo-China, but later joined De Gaulle in dissolving the empire. He personally issued the proclamation freeing Syria in September 1941 and Lebanon two months later, in 1955 negotiated the return of the Sultan of Morocco to his throne and later vigorously supported Algerian independence. For all of this he earned De Gaulle's praise as a soldier "possessing the sense of the greatness of France...