Chavez cancer surgery successful: VP

CARACAS: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s latest round of cancer surgery was successful and the leader was recovering in his Cuban hospital room, the country’s vice president said Tuesday.

“We want to thank all the love, the pure love ... for this operation ended correctly and successfully,” Vice President Nicolas Maduro said in an address to the nation. A visibly moved Marduro, to whom Chavez delegated power before leaving to undergo his fourth round of cancer surgery in Havana, added that “Commander Chavez was back in his room” and would shortly begin a “post-operative phase” that would last several days. Tareck El Aissami, a former interior minister and member of Venezuela’s ruling party, took to the airwaves shortly after doctors began operating to tell the Venezuelan people all was “going well.”

The president is “in the hands of God,” Aissami said, speaking on the state-owned Venezuelan television station VTV. “All is going well, and we have been informed.”

Chavez’s medical team expressed “optimism” as the cancer-stricken Venezuelan president went into surgery, while hundreds of faithful supporters gathered to pray that the longtime, omnipresent leader would live. afp

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