Aides: Chavez in tough fight, may miss swearing-in
People, one holding an image of Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, gather to pray for him at Simon Bolivar square in Caracas, Venezuela, Tuesday, Dec. 11, 2012. Doctors began operating on Chavez in Cuba, his government said, after his cancer reappeared despite a year and a half of surgeries and treatments. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)