Somdet Phra Nyanasamvara | Thai Buddhist patriarch, 100

Somdet Phra Nyanasamvara, 100, Thailand's supreme patriarch, who headed the country's order of Buddhist monks for more than two decades, died Thursday.

Doctors said he died of a blood infection in a Bangkok hospital, where he had been treated since being admitted for an illness more than a decade ago.

The supreme patriarch's successor will be appointed by Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

Thailand is the world's most heavily Buddhist country, with more than 90 percent of its 67 million people members of the religion. As the head of the religion, the patriarch has legal authority to oversee different sects of Buddhism. - AP