OMAN-RELIGION-ISLAM-POLITICS

A picture taken on October, 26 2017 shows worshippers' shoes left outside Muscat's Dhu Al-Nurayn mosque in the Gulf sultanate of Oman. Oman -- home to Sunnis, Shiites and adherents of the Ibadi branch of Islam, the sultanate's majority sect -- increasingly stands out as a bastion of coexistence in the Middle East. Respect for other religious sects is not an accident. It is enshrined in Omani law, a legal system that has also, according to Human Rights Watch, been employed to stifle free speech, with the shuttering of the independent Azaman newspaper. / AFP PHOTO / GIUSEPPE CACACE (Photo credit should read GIUSEPPE CACACE/AFP via Getty Images)