Iran picks new leader

IRAN has named Ayatollah Mojtabba Khamenei, a son of its late supreme leader, as its next ruler, putting a hard-line cleric in charge as the war spreading across the Middle East sent oil prices soaring, with the Islamic Republic launching new attacks on regional energy infrastructure.

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With Iran's theocracy under assault by the United States and Israel for more than a week, the country’s Assembly of Experts chose the secretive 56-year-old cleric with close ties to the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard as the new supreme leader.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin sent a telegram to Mojtaba Khamenei to congratulate him on becoming Iran’s new leader. The message, published on the Kremlin’s website yesterday, reaffirmed Moscow's "unwavering support for Tehran’, and said that "Russia has been and will remain a reliable partner of the Islamic Republic".