Mullah Omar`s family declares support for new Taliban leader

Kabul: Taliban insurgents say that the family of late Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar has announced their support for Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour as his successor.

A statement posted on the Taliban's web site yesterday said that Mullah Omar's brother, Mullah Abdul Manan, and eldest son, Mullah Mohammad Yaqoub, declared their support for Mansour's leadership in a gathering of senior Taliban officials.

Manan confirmed to The Associated Press that he and Yaqoub are now pledging their alliance to Mansour; the pair, along with several other senior Taliban commanders, initially rejected Mansour's ascension.

The reversal should remove one of the main obstacles to Mansour's fledgling leadership, but there are still a number of other Taliban commanders who oppose Mansour as the leader. Elsewhere in Afghanistan, a suicide car bombing killed four people, including the local chief of criminal investigations, in the Paghman district, west of the capital Kabul.

Abdul Qadier, the district governor of Paghman, said the car bomber attacked a government compound around 10 a.M. The attack also wounded at least 10 civilians, he said.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack.