The US administration assumes that Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is alive, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in an interview with Fox News.
“We have evidence that he is alive. Apparently they claim so. We have no evidence to the contrary“, he said.
In early April, The Times, citing intelligence information received, reported that Iran's Supreme Leader was receiving treatment and was not involved in decision-making.
Rubio said that he had never had contact with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.
“I have never spoken to the Iranian Foreign Minister. As I said, he rarely communicated with our people. These are mostly indirect conversations," the secretary of state said.
“There have been some direct contacts in the last few weeks in relation to meetings that have taken place. Remember, the Iranian system has long had a ban on direct communication with Americans“, the secretary of state explained.
“But direct contacts with them are very rare, very confidential and only happen through one or two people in their system“, Rubio added.