ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ‘seriously wounded in air strike’: report

Mumbai: The leader of Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has sustained serious injuries in an airstrike in western Iraq on March 18, the Guardian newspaper reported on Tuesday.

According to the report, ISIS leader suffered life-threatening injuries during an airstrike by the US-led coalition, but has made a slow recovery.

Hisham al-Hashimi, an Iraqi official who advises Baghdad on ISIA, told The Guardian: “Yes, he was wounded in al-Baaj near the village of Umm al-Rous on 18 March with a group that was with him.”

Baghdadi had on June 29, 2014 declared "caliph" in an attempt to revive a system of rule that ended nearly 100 years ago with the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

Baghdadi, born in Samarra in 1971 according to Washington, apparently joined the insurgency that erupted shortly after the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, at one point spending time in an American military prison in the country.

In October 2011, the US Treasury designated him as a "terrorist", and there is now a $10-million bounty for his capture.