Pak Taliban elects 'illiterate' warlord Khan Said Sajna to replace Mehsud

Pakistani Taliban has elected Khan Said Sajna aka "Khalid" as the next chief of the militant group, just a day after their former leader Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in a U.S. drone strike in North Waziristan.

A meeting of the Pakistani Taliban's Shura Council was held at an undisclosed location on Saturday to decide the next leader of the banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Dawn News reports.

All 43 members of the Shura council, who were present in the meeting, voted in favor of Sajna, however, his election was not confirmed by splinter groups of the militant organization, the report added.

The 36-year-old is believed to be involved in the Naval base attack in Karachi and masterminding a 2012 jailbreak, which freed 400 Taliban inmates in the northwestern city of Bannu.

However, Sajna has no basic education, conventional or religious, but has experience of fighting in Afghanistan, the report added.

Mehsud and five other Taliban militants were killed on Friday, when four missiles hit the TTP chief's vehicle after he left from a meeting in Dande Darpakhel area to discuss peace offers from the government.