Tunisian media are reporting the country’s 92-year-old president has passed away after being hospitalized for the third time in recent weeks. Radio station Mosaique and state broadcaster Wataniya have reported Beji Caid Essebsi was hospitalized Wednesday night for unspecified health trouble. Essebsi’s office did not make an announcement or respond to requests for comment. He “is in intensive care at the military hospital and things are not going well,” Hafedh Caid Essebsi told AFP earlier. Essebsi is Tunisia’s first democratically elected president, having won office in 2014 in the wake of the country’s Arab Spring uprising. He recently announced he wouldn’t run in the election scheduled for November, saying a younger person should lead the country. He was hospitalized twice in June. His office released a video of the president meeting with the defense minister Monday, and Essebsi was visibly weakened, raising concerns about his fitness for office. Agencies
