Staff Correspondent

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia will be taken to London first and then to a third country for advanced treatment very soon.

“Considering her health condition, we have started preparations to transfer her to a multidisciplinary hospital abroad as quickly as possible,” her personal physician, Prof AZM Zahid Hossain, said on Tuesday.

“As part of the process, we are securing a ‘long-distance specialised air ambulance’ and establishing necessary communications," he said.

"She [Khaleda] will initially be flown to London, where, after a brief stopover, she will be taken to the country where there are multidisciplinary medical facilities. We hope to complete all the formalities soon so that Madam can travel abroad promptly.”

Zahid added that Khaleda Zia’s office has already informed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding her treatment abroad, including details of the doctors, nurses, and relatives who will accompany her.

Khaleda, also a former prime minister, has long battled various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, and issues related to the kidney, lung, heart and eyes.

On 26 October last year, three US specialist doctors completed the hepatic procedure known as the transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS procedure) to stop water accretion in Khaleda Zia's stomach and chest, and bleeding in her liver.

Khaleda's doctors have been recommending sending her abroad since she was diagnosed with liver cirrhosis in November 2021.

The former prime minister was sent to Old Dhaka Central Jail on 8 February 2018, after a special court sentenced her to five years in prison in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case.

On 30 October 2018, the High Court raised her punishment to 10 years. Later, she was convicted in the Zia Charitable Trust corruption case.

Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, the government temporarily freed Khaleda from jail after 776 days through an executive order, suspending her sentence on 25 March 2020, with conditions that she would stay in her Gulshan house and not leave the country.

On 6 August this year, Khaleda was completely freed by an order of President Mohammed Shahabuddin.