Argentine president cancer surgery called success

Argentina's President Cristina Kirchner underwent three-and-a-half hours of cancer surgery Wednesday and emerged "without any problem," according to her spokesman. Kirchner had the surgery to remove her thyroid gland in the city of Pilar, 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of Buenos Aires. "The operation was performed on the president without any problem or complication," said presidential spokesman Alfredo Scoccimarro while reading a statement in front of Hospital Austral, where hundreds of supporters had gathered to show their support. Kirchner awoke after the surgery and showed signs of "a good immediate post-operative recovery," according to a statement from her surgeon, Pedro Saco. Kirchner's cancer was discovered during a routine medical exam on December 22, only 12 days after she was re-inaugurated as Argentina's president. She won re-election in October by a landslide 54 percent margin. She is scheduled to be hospitalized for 72 hours with a 20-day recovery period, during which Vice President Amado Boudou is taking over Kirchner's executive branch responsibilities. The president, 58, arrived at the hospital Wednesday morning with her children Max and Florence on board a helicopter. Kirchner, the country's first elected female president, was diagnosed with cancer "on the right lobe of the thyroid gland," Scoccimarro said last week. Doctors predicted she would be able to resume all of her duties as president. "The prospects are excellent and one would not expect any further growth of the tumor after the operation," said Mario Bruno, an oncologist and a member of the Argentina Association of Cancer. Supporters camped out during a two-day vigil on the hospital campus put up posters that said, "Be Strong Cristina." They also put up Argentine flags and banners showing the faces of Kirchner and her deceased husband, Nestor, who preceded her as president. Dozens of television camera crews, reporters and photographers hung around the hospital since Tuesday night in sometimes oppressive heat. Security was spread over a wide area by members of the military police, Buenos Aires federal police and presidential security force. Before the surgery, Kirchner rested Tuesday at the official presidential residence in Olivos, where she had returned after spending New Year's Day with her children and other relatives at her country home in the Patagonian town of El Calafate, where her husband died October 27, 2010. Her counterparts among Latin American leaders sent her messages wishing her a speedy recovery. Kirchner is one of several Latin American leaders to suffer from cancer since 2009. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo have all waged battles against the disease and say they are now cancer-free. Former Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was diagnosed with throat cancer in late October and has undergone chemotherapy treatments. He re-entered a hospital this week for radiation therapy. Chavez last week speculated that the United States could have developed a "technology to induce cancer" in Latin American leaders, without offering any evidence that such technology existed.