DHAKA, 12 March 2008 — Detained former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Hasina Wajed was admitted to a private hospital yesterday as one of her top aides was sentenced to 13 years in jail for corruption.
Hasina’s personal physicians said her health condition was worsening because of a critical attack of allergy, an unstable blood pressure and an impaired hearing.
Hasina, who was arrested last July and interned in a government apartment, has been complaining of ill health and demanded treatment abroad, said Dhaka central Jail official Shamsur Haider Siddiqui. “The jail code does not permit any prisoner facing trial to receive medical help outside the country if such facilities are available at home,” Siddiqui said
Hasina, 64, has been accused of receiving extortion money for sealing a business deal during her term as prime minister between 1996 and 2001.
A special court dealing with graft cases yesterday sentenced a close aide of Hasina and former Awami League lawmaker, H.B.M. Iqbal, to 13 years in prison on two counts. He was sentenced to 10 years for accumulating wealth illegally and to a further three years for submitting a false wealth statement to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC). The two sentences will run consecutively.
Judge Feroz Alam also fined Iqbal five million taka and ordered that the failure to pay the fine would result in an additional one year behind the bars.
The court also jailed Iqbal’s wife Momtaz Begum Doly, their two sons Moyeen Iqbal and Imran Iqbal and daughter Nowrin Iqbal each to three years for illegally amassing wealth.
