Amid scourge of coronavirus, the Bangladesh government has conditionally released former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia and suspended her sentence for six months.
After serving 25 month in jail for corruption cases, she was released through executive orders from the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University on Wednesday evening, bdnews24 reported.
The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chef was driven to her residence in the captial city’s Gulshan area, as scores of supporters crowded her path and shouted slogans.
Earlier on Thursday, the Home ministry had issued an order for Khaleda’s release to the prison authorities.
Khaleda, who is ailing, had been receiving treatment in prison said the bdnews24 report.
Expressing concerns over Khaleda’s health amid “risks of coronavirus infection”, BNP lawyers demanded her release the day before.
BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said they wanted to keep Khaleda in “quarantine” and party leaders were discussing ways to keep her supporters away for some days.
Khaleda has been in prison since February 2018 after she was sentenced to a total of 17 years in two graft cases involving Zia Orphanage Trust and Zia Charitable Trust.
She was initially kept at Old Dhaka’s abandoned central prison, but on April 1, 2019 she was moved to Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University for treatment.