ALGIERS, April 22 (Xinhua) -- Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has left the French hospital after undergoing post-surgical examinations there, his office said in a statement on Saturday.

    "The post-surgical check-up was declared very satisfactory," said the statement, published by the official news agency APS. It indicated that Bouteflika left the Val de Grace military hospital in Paris on Friday afternoon.

    The 69-year-old leader went through an operation in the same hospital for a bleeding stomach ulcer late last year. He returned to Algeria after recovering for two weeks.

    Algerian authorities gave little information about the operation, sparking speculations about Bouteflika's health, including suggestions that he might be suffering from a stomach cancer, which the government dismissed as "crazy rumors."

    French and Algerian authorities confirmed on Thursday that Bouteflika had undergone medical examinations, which they said were a long-planned routine follow-up check.

    French sources said that the check was the third since the operation. The visit came amid diplomatic strain between France and the former French colony in north Africa after Bouteflika accused France of committing "genocide" over Algerians during the colonization history.

    Bouteflika became the seventh president in 1995 and was re-elected in 2004, the first head of state to win a second term since Algeria's independence from France in 1962. He is widely credited in Algeria for taming the violent confrontations between government security forces and rebels. Enditem