Male:
Former Maldives president Mohamed Nasheed was in a “critical” situation on Friday following an assassination try, physicians mentioned.
Nasheed, 53, the Maldives’ very first democratically elected president and nonetheless an vital figure in the island nation’s murky politics, was rushed to hospital just after an explosion late Thursday.
Since then he has undergone 16 hours of life-saving operations in the capital Male for injuries to his head, chest, abdomen and limbs.
The private ADK hospital mentioned Friday evening that Nasheed was “in a critical condition in intensive care”.
In a televised address to the nation, President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih announced that a group from the Australian Federal Police (AFP) would arrive Saturday to enable with the investigation into the blast.
Solih described the attack as an assault on the fledgling democracy, promising the perpetrators “would face the full force of the law”.
Police mentioned officials from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime have also been asked to help in the investigation.
Maldivian police mentioned they had been treating Thursday’s bomb attack as a “deliberate act of terror” and urged the public to provide any data that could determine the perpetrators.
Police mentioned a device attached to a motorcycle was detonated as Nasheed got into a car or truck in the capital.
The hospital mentioned earlier that shrapnel had been removed from one of his lungs and from his liver but that a further piece was nonetheless in the identical organ.
“We are hopeful of a full recovery,” mentioned a loved ones member who did not want to be named, adding that Nasheed was responsive and spoke with physicians when he was admitted.
One of his bodyguards as nicely as a British national had been also wounded and taken to hospital.
Underwater cabinet
The Indian Ocean nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims is finest identified for its luxury vacation resorts well-known with honeymooners, but it suffers from frequent political turmoil.
There was no claim of duty for Thursday’s bomb attack, but officials close to Nasheed’s Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) mentioned they suspected vested political interests opposed to his anti-corruption drive.
Nasheed had vowed to investigate a $90-million theft from the state’s tourism promotion authority throughout the tenure of former president Abdulla Yameen.
“There are some dormant Islamists who could have collaborated with political elements threatened by Nasheed’s anti-corruption drive,” an MDP supply told AFP.
The government has cracked down on extremism and foreign preachers are banned.
Violent attacks have been uncommon, even though a dozen foreign vacationers had been wounded by a bomb blast in Male in 2007.
The Islamic State claimed a boat arson attack last year, but there is small proof the group has a presence in the archipelago.
Nasheed, a liberal, is possibly finest identified internationally for holding a 2009 underwater cabinet meeting to highlight the threat of international warming, signing documents as officials wore scuba gear against a backdrop of coral reefs.
He was toppled in a military-backed coup in February 2012, convicted on a charge of terrorism and jailed for 13 years.
He left the nation on prison leave for healthcare therapy and sought refuge in Britain.
He returned just after his nominee Solih won the presidency in 2018, winning parliamentary elections the next year to develop into speaker.
Messages of help for Nasheed poured in on Friday from neighbouring India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as nicely as Western nations, which have strongly backed his pro-democracy and environmental activism.
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