Goa, July 5 -- Three sons of slain Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei joined funeral prayers beside his coffin in Tehran on Sunday, while his successor and son, Mojtaba Khamenei, remained absent from the public ceremony, fuelling speculation over his health following the February 28 airstrike that killed several members of the Khamenei family.

State television broadcast images of Mostafa, Meysam and Masoud Khamenei standing behind the coffins of their father and four other relatives inside the vast Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla complex. Among the deceased were Khamenei's daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and his 14-month-old granddaughter, all of whom were killed during the US-Israel strikes that marked the beginning of the conflict...