[8][9] In 2009, after a one-year hiatus, Riyadh Al-Azzawi returned to training in order to defend his WKN and WKA world championship titles.

On November 24, 2017 Al-Azzawi defeated Tanislav Tomashevkii of Poland in the main event at Kickboxing Grand Prix held in Baghdad, Iraq.

[7][11][12] Al-Azzawi was keen on defending his title in his hometown of Baghdad, Iraq, to bring a story of success to an otherwise war-torn nation.

The kickboxing champion passed through a turbulent period in his life because of his association with Lebanese pop diva Suzanne Tamim who was brutally murdered in Dubai.

Riyadh Al-Azzawi told The Sunday Times[13] in an exclusive interview that at the time of her murder, he and Suzanne were "married" (this despite vehement claims by Tamim's second husband and manager Adel Matouk that he and Suzanne Tamim were still legally married after she divorced her first husband Ali Muzannar.

Al-Azzawi said his spouse's former lover, Egyptian business tycoon and member of Egyptian Parliament Hisham Talaat Moustafa had offered her $50m to lure her away from Al-Azzawi and marry him — and threatened to pay a hitman to have Suzanne killed, if she refused to marry him.