News Digest

Iran’s supreme leader recovering in hospital after prostate surgery

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is recovering in hospital after having prostate surgery, state media has said. The country’s official news agency, IRNA, described the operation that took place this morning as “routine” and said it was successful. The 75-year-old leader was admitted to a government hospital in the capital Tehran, IRNA reported. Media reports on the state of Khamenei’s health are extremely rare.

If a nation is not strong, the world’s extortionists will extort from it, insult it and if they can, they will trample on it.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaking in March, in his annual speech for the Persian New Year, Nowruz.

As ayatollah, he has the final say on all state matters in Iran. He has been the country’s top leader since the 1989 death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who led the Iranian revolution. Khamenei thwarted the movement in support of a reformist presidential candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi, in 2009, and when hundreds of thousands of Iranians rose up around the country marching in the streets, some overtly denouncing him, he stepped forward to crush the protests. Khamenei has kept Iran on a firmly anti-U.S. path, pushing ahead with its nuclear ambitions despite international pressure and sanctions.