BAGHDAD — Jalal Talabani, the president of Iraq, will be flown to Germany for medical treatment for a stroke suffered this week, officials said on Wednesday. The president, 79, was said to be in “stable” condition, and the decision was announced after medical specialists from abroad were dispatched to the hospital to assess the possibility of sending him out of the country for further treatment.
Andrew Gombert/European Pressphoto Agency
President Jalal Talabani in September 2011.
Mr. Talabani, whose influence in mediating disputes among the country’s many political factions has far outweighed the limited powers of the office he occupies, was rushed to the hospital on Monday after having the stroke.
In a brief update on Wednesday, the Iraqi medical staff at the Baghdad Medical City said that “his health is stable” and that doctors were using the same medical procedures on him that they had used when he was admitted to the facility, where newly arrived medical experts from Iran, Germany and Britain had begun to monitor his condition, the Iraqi staff said.
The head of the president’s media office, Barazan Sheikh Othman, said that the medical teams “have seen that his health is better” and that he can travel to Germany on Thursday to continue treatment.
One of the country’s two vice presidents, Khudayr al-Khuzai, a Shiite, will take on Mr. Talabani’s duties in his absence. Mr. Talabani’s illness, announced in a statement from his office on Tuesday, cast a shadow over the Kurdish lands in the north where he once fought a guerrilla war and where he now lives. It added a new element of uncertainty to the country’s divided politics a year after the American military departed, leaving Iraq’s leaders to steer the country’s shaky democracy on their own.
Mr. Talabani has been treated abroad for medical conditions in recent years. At a news conference on Tuesday at the same hospital, a doctor had also described Mr. Talabani’s condition as “stable” and said he expected it to improve. On Twitter, Mr. Talabani’s son, Qubad Talabani, who represents the Kurdistan Regional Government in Washington, wrote that “we hope can begin his recovery soon.”
But privately other officials have suggested his condition was more serious. A hospital official, as well as a high-level government official — both of whom requested anonymity out of respect for Mr. Talabani’s family — said Tuesday that the president was in a coma.
The Iraqi medical staff did not take questions in their comments on Wednesday.
Iraq’s Stricken President To Be Flown to Germany for Treatment
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Iraq’s Stricken President To Be Flown to Germany for Treatment
