Afghan Taliban Appoints A New Leader, Kabul Urges Peace

The Afghan Taliban named an Islamic legal scholar who was one of former leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour's deputies to succeed him Wednesday after confirming Mansour's death in a U.S. drone strike over the weekend. Within an hour of the announcement, a Taliban suicide bomber attacked a shuttle bus carrying court employees west of the Afghan capital of Kabul, killing as many as 11 people and wounding several others, including children. New Taliban leader Haibatullah Akhundzada was named in a United Nations report last year as former chief of the Sharia-based justice system under the Taliban's five-year rule over Afghanistan, which ended with their ouster in 2001. Sirajuddin Haqqani, head of a feared network blamed for many deadly bomb attacks in Kabul in recent years, and Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, son of Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, will serve as deputies. The announcement, following a meeting of the Taliban's main shura, or leadership council, ended days of confusion during which the Taliban declined to confirm the death of Mansour in a drone strike in Pakistan on Saturday.