Osama Bin Laden is Dead : Security Expert informs - Ayman al-Zawahri to succeed ?

(CBS/AP)  

Osama bin Laden, the long-time figurehead of the al Qaeda terrorist network, has been buried at sea after being killed in a U.S. raid in Pakistan.

U.S. officials told CBS News that bin Laden's body would be handled in accordance with Muslim traditions, which include strict rules on burial taking place within 24 hours after death.

Bin Laden was a Saudi national, but officials tell CBS News that the Kingdom was unwilling to have his remains repatriated.

He was killed in a U.S. raid launched early Monday in the relatively-well-heeled town of Abbottabad, near the Pakistani capital of Islamabad.


Who will succeed Bin Laden?

Egyptian-born doctor and surgeon Ayman al-Zawahri is al-Qaida's no. 2 leader likely to succeed Osama bin Laden, who was killed in a US-led operation. Following are some key facts about Zawahri: * Zawahri is described as the chief organizer of al-Qaida and al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden's closest mentor. * Zawahri and bin Laden met in the mid-1980s when both were in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar to support mujahideen guerrillas fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan. * Born in 1951 to a prominent Cairo family, Zawahri was the son of a pharmacology professor and grandson of the grand imam of Al Azhar, one of the most important mosques in the Arab world. * He graduated from Egypt's most prestigious medical school in 1974. * When the militant Egyptian Islamic Jihad was founded in 1973, he joined. When members posed as soldiers and assassinated President Anwar Sadat in 1981, he was among 301 people arrested. He went on trial but was cleared of involvement in Sadat's death. He did, however, spend three years in jail for possession of an unlicensed pistol. * Zawahri has broadcast dozens of messages since the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States in 2001. In the latest monitored by the SITE Intelligence Group last month, he urged Muslims to fight NATO and American forces in Libya.