ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud, reportedly wounded in a drone strike last month, has died, CNN reported Tuesday citing three Taliban sources.
Pakistan's Dawn newspaper also reported Hakimullah's death, quoting the Taliban in the Orakzai tribal agency, adding Pakistani government officials had confirmed it.
In a similar report on his death, the Press Trust of India news agency said Taliban sources in the Orakzai region told TV news channels the 28-year-old had been severely injured in a drone attack Jan. 14 in Shaktoi area of the North Waziristan tribal Agency.
Japan's Kyodo News also quoted an authoritative official source that there were strong indications Hakimullah has died.
There had been much speculation for weeks about the death of Hakimullah, who took over the Pakistani group after the death of Baitullah Meshud in a similar drone attack last August.
The sources told CNN Hakimullah died near Multan in Pakistan's Punjab province as he was being taken to a treatment center in Karachi. Last week, a Taliban spokesman had said the leader was alive and in hiding.
The drone attack occurred a few days after Hakimullah was seen in a Taliban-released video with the man believed to be the suicide bomber who killed seven CIA officers and consultants and a Jordanian army captain Dec. 30 at a base in eastern Afghanistan, CNN reported.
Sources told Dawn Maulvi Noor Jamal had been nominated as Hakimullah's successor. Jamal, known for his brutality, had been a teacher at a local Madrassa before becoming a Taliban leader, Dawn said, adding he is the man seen recently in a video flogging two men and a teenager.
