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Gabon's President Ali Bongo arrived in Morocco on Thursday for a recovery after a month of treatment at a Saudi hospital, a Moroccan diplomatic source said.
Bongo, 59, has been in hospital in Saudi Arabia since October 24, when he became ill at an economic forum.
The official Saudi news agency said Bongo had left King Salman Air Base in Riyadh on Wednesday evening, and that officials from the Saudi Foreign Ministry had left him.
After arriving in Rabat Thursday morning, the Gabonese leader was taken to a hospital in the Moroccan capital, said the diplomatic source without giving more details.
His transfer was "in accordance with the wishes of His Excellency President Bongo, in agreement with the constitutional institutions of the Gabonese Republic, and in accordance with the opinion of the doctors," the Moroccan Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
After a long period of silence, the Gabonese presidency finally admitted that Bongo was "gravely ill" and had undergone surgery, while claiming that he was recovering.
His recovery would take weeks, if not days, according to a source from the presidency.
The Gabonese president and the Moroccan king Mohammed VI maintain close relations since their youth.
Over the past month, the Gabonese Presidency has only issued two statements on Bongo's health. On October 29, he had first declared that he had been taken to the hospital "suffering from extreme fatigue".
Then on November 11, Bongo's office admitted that he was "seriously ill" and that he had been operated on.
The absence of official news – as well as memories of the secret death surrounding the death of Bongo's father, Omar Bongo, in 2009 after decades at the helm – sparked many rumors, including speculation that he was incapacitated or even dead.
Earlier this month, a foreign source close to Bongo and his French wife, Sylvia, told AFP that the Gabonese president had been stricken with a stroke.
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