Rubio: U.S. believes Iran's supreme leader is alive

The U.S. administration assumes that Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is alive.

This was stated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio in an interview with Fox News.

"Well, we have evidence that suggests so. Obviously, they (representatives of the Iranian side - ed. TASS) claim this. We have no evidence to the contrary," he said in response to a related question.

At the beginning of April, The Times newspaper, citing intelligence data it obtained, reported that Iran's Supreme Leader was allegedly undergoing treatment and not participating in decision-making.

The U.S. and Israel started a war against Iran on February 28. On April 7, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a two-week mutual ceasefire with the Islamic Republic. According to Iranian sources, over 40 days of war, 3,375 Iranians were killed as a result of U.S.-Israeli strikes. On April 11, Tehran and Washington held talks in Islamabad, but the parties failed to reach an agreement on long-term conflict resolution due to a number of disagreements. On April 21, the U.S. President announced his intention to extend the ceasefire regime with Iran. As reported by Iranian state television, Tehran does not intend to recognize the unilaterally declared extension of the ceasefire regime by Washington and will act in accordance with its own interests.

Source: TASS