Tag: new leader

KABUL: Religious scholar Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, named Wednesday as the Afghan Taliban's new leader, was a senior judge during the insurgent group's five-year rule over Afghanistan and issued many of its harsh verdicts.

BAGHDAD: An increasingly isolated Nuri al-Maliki again protested his removal as Iraqi prime minister on Wednesday, as his own political party and his former sponsor in Iran publicly endorsed a successor who many in Baghdad hope can halt advancing Sunni jihadists.