TEHRAN // Iran’s supreme leader underwent prostate surgery yesterday and was recovering at a government hospital in Tehran, state media reported.
It was a rare report on the state of health of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 75, who has been Iran’s top leader since 1989. He was reported to be in “good condition” and his doctors said he was resting after the surgery.
President Hassan Rouhani visited Ayatollah Khamenei in hospital after the procedure and later said his condition is “very good and hence, the people should not be worried”.
The official IRNA news agency described the operation as “routine” and said it was successful, without giving details on what had prompted it or the underlying medical condition.
Head of Ayatollah Khamenei’s medical team, Dr Ali Reza Marandi, said the procedure took less than half an hour and was performed under local anaesthesia. He said Ayatollah Khamenei will need three to four days of rest.
Before the surgery, state TV aired a brief footage of Ayatollah Khamenei in which he asked people to pray for him.
“There is no room for concern, but this does not mean that they — the people — should not pray.”
Most Iranian state TV and radio channels kept broadcasting their regular programs yesterday, an indication that the situation was business as usual.
Ayatollah Khamenei was a close ally of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomenei who led the 1979 Islamic Revolution and was later Iran’s supreme leader until his death in 1989. He served as Iran’s president for eight years before becoming the supreme leader in 1989.
Ayatollah Khamenei has kept Iran on a firmly anti-US path, pushing ahead with its nuclear ambitions despite international pressure and sanctions. At the same time, Iran sought to extend its influence in the Middle East through its ally Syria and Islamist militant groups despite attempt by Gulf Arab governments to contain Iran.
More recently, Ayatollah Khamenei has lent support to the talks between Iran and the six world powers on Tehran’s controversial nuclear programme and the breakthrough interim agreement those talks produced last November.
But he has also expressed doubts the talks will lead anywhere. Last month, Ayatollah Khamenei said the United States had only grown more hostile to Iran since the talks began, and that there was no point in holding direct negotiations with Washington.
The UN’s nuclear agency is trying to investigate allegations that Iran secretly worked on nuclear weapons — something Tehran denies, insisting its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only, such as power generation and cancer treatment.
Ayatollah Khamenei has backed the reformist Mr Rouhani, who took office in August 2013, and his efforts to stabilise the national currency and halt inflation. But the government has a long way to go to deliver on promises of economic growth.
Ayatollah Khamenei this year said the priority for Iranians is to make their economy immune to outside pressures. He has called UN and Western sanctions imposed over Iran’s nuclear programme a “full-fledged economic war” on his country and has ordered the government to create an “economy of resistance” to counter the measures.
The project involves efforts to diversify Iran’s exports, reduce dependence on sales of raw materials and promote knowledge-based high-tech industries.
* Associated Press
