Maldives permits jailed ex-president to have surgery abroad

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — The Maldives government said Saturday that it has given permission to an imprisoned ex-president to travel to Britain for surgery.

The foreign ministry said in a statement that the permission was given on condition that Mohamed Nasheed serves the remaining years of his sentence once he returns.

Nasheed was sentenced to 13 years in prison last March for ordering the military to detain a senior judge when he was president in 2012. The move led to weeks of public protests leading to his resignation.

President Yameen Abdul Gayoom's administration drew widespread international condemnation over Nasheed's sentencing for an apparent lack of due process.

The United Nations working group on arbitrary detention has ruled Nasheed's imprisonment improper and called for his immediate release.

Nasheed's party spokesman Hamid Abdul Gaffoor said the former president has still not been officially informed of the government decision.

Nasheed became the first democratically elected president of this Indian Ocean archipelago state in 2008 ending a 30-year autocracy led by Gayoom's half-brother.

His attempt to return to office in 2013 failed when Yameen Abdul Gayoom won a disputed presidential election.

-- (c) Associated Press 2016-01-17

Yeah for sure he'll be back to his jail cell, or, he will do the Thaksin tango... gone to China for the

games and never came back...

What a joke, here's an idea, how bout he has the surgery when he's released. I wonder if tax payers are funding this nonesense? Let me guess, he gets to take the presidential plane to the UK?

I don't understand the comments. Nasheed is a good man and the victim here isn't he? Watch The Island President or Google him.

How does a convicted person get a visa to travel to the UK? I thought anyone with a criminal record or an imprisonment sentence of more than 12 months is excluded from admission to the UK.

In most countries, you can apply for a waiver to the exclusion.

Yeah for sure he'll be back to his jail cell, or, he will do the Thaksin tango... gone to China for the

games and never came back...

Just when you think a smidgeon of common sense was returning to the world you read something like this. Will they wish him bum voyage. Its his get out of jail card plain and simple another runner never to return.

What a joke, here's an idea, how bout he has the surgery when he's released. I wonder if tax payers are funding this nonesense? Let me guess, he gets to take the presidential plane to the UK?

Of course tax payers are funding this nonsense. The perks never stop even when the elite are behind bars. I wonder what his jail cell or jail suite looked like. No wonder people are loosing hope.

Maldives is a presidential representative democratic republic wherein the military are commanded by the civilian government. It seems they are not as paranoid as Prayut with political opposition.

Maybe the lovely Mrs. Clooney will help you understand what's going on.....

http://www.people.com/article/amal-clooney-defends-former-maldives-president-mohamed-nasheed-video

It is true he going to a Hospital in Israel

If they are hoping he skips, so no longer an issue and everybody will forget him, did not Thailand try something like that a few years ago...