Havel Has Abdominal Operation

Czech President Vaclav Havel underwent three-hour abdominal surgery Sunday, intended to restore his digestive tract after his colon ruptured earlier this year.

“The operation went quite well, without any complications or surprises,” Ernst Bodner, chief surgeon at the Innsbruck University hospital in Austria, said shortly after finishing the operation.

In April, the president, 61, was rushed to a surgical ward in Innsbruck from the nearby Alps after doctors diagnosed a ruptured colon and acute peritonitis.

Havel was expected to refrain from public political activities for the rest of the summer. The president, long a chain smoker, has been hospitalized five times since December 1996, when he had a third of his right lung and a tumor removed.