Maldives: former President Mohamed Nasheed, victim of an attack, in "critical condition"
Maldivian police at the scene of the attack which targeted former President of the Republic Mohamed Nasheed.
May 6, 2021. AFP - -
Text by: RFI Follow
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The former president of the Maldives and current head of parliament Mohamed Nasheed was injured Thursday evening by a bomb explosion in the capital Malé.
Seriously injured, he is in "critical condition".
An emergency session of Parliament was called following this assassination attempt.
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The first democratically elected head of state in the archipelago known as a luxury tourist destination, the 53-year-old official was seriously injured Thursday evening, May 6, by the explosion of a device hanging on a motorcycle as he was about to get into his car. "
Nasheed escaped an assassination attempt
," a government official told AFP by telephone. "
He is in critical condition
," according to hospital information. His bodyguard was also shot.
The explosion came shortly before the entry into force of a nighttime curfew in the capital as part of health restrictions to combat the Covid-19 epidemic.
Authorities said the homemade bomb was hung from a motorcycle parked in a narrow driveway leading to Mr. Nasheed's home.
Australian Federal Police investigators are expected to assist Maldivian investigators.
Messages of support have multiplied from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, as well as from several Western countries which have often in the past supported Mr. Nasheed's fight for democracy, but also his commitment to it. environment.
At this stage no claims, but relatives of the party of Mohamed Nasheed (the PDM, democratic party of the Maldives) suspect individuals opposed to his anti-corruption campaign of having joined forces with Islamists to organize the attack.
The former president had announced his intention to launch an investigation into the embezzlement of $ 90 million from the Tourism Promotion Authority during the presidency of Abdulla Yameen who ruled the archipelago heavily dependent on tourism from 2013 to 2018
Coup d'etat and exile
With 340,000 inhabitants, Sunni Muslims, the Maldives are known as a luxury tourist destination, but the archipelago is also plagued by recurring political instability.
Mohamed Nasheed became the first democratically elected president of the Maldives in the first multiparty poll in 2008. He was overthrown in a coup in 2012 and
sentenced to 13 years in prison
in 2015 on terrorism charges, a verdict denounced by human rights organizations as politically motivated.
Allowed to be released from prison for medical treatment, Mohamed Nasheed went into exile in Great Britain but returned to his country in 2018. He became
Speaker of Parliament, the
second highest post in the state hierarchy, after the 2019 elections.
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