Online Desk  :  British High Commissioner to Bangladesh Sarah Cooke met BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia and enquired about her health on Wednesday night. The meeting was held at BNP Chairperson’s Firoza residence in the city’s Gulshan area at 8:30pm, said BNP Media Cell member Sayrul Kabir Khan. It was Khaleda Zia’s first meeting with any foreign envoy since 2018 following her acquittal from her convictions in graft cases. Sarah Cooke met Khaleda ahead of her visit to the UK for better treatment, party sources said.

BNP standing committee member Prof Dr AZM Zahid Hossain, chief of her medical board Prof Shahabuddin Talukder, Dr FM Siddique, and member of the Special Assistant to BNP Chairperson’s Foreign Affairs Advisory Committee Tabith Awal were present. On 8 July, Khaleda Zia, a former prime minister, was admitted to Evercare Hospital in the capital six days after she had been discharged from the same hospital with various ailments. On 24 August, she returned home after receiving treatment at the hospital for 45 days.

A group of specialist doctors, led by Prof Shahabuddin Talukder, successfully installed a pacemaker in Khaleda Zia’s chest on 23 June. Khaleda has long been battling various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, and issues related to the kidney, lung, heart, and eyes. Khaleda’s doctors have been recommending sending her abroad since she was diagnosed with liver cirrhosis in November 2021. 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.

She was placed in 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 coronavirus outbreak, the government temporarily freed Khaleda Zia 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 last, Khaleda Zia was completely freed by an order of President Mohammed Shahabuddin. The president passed the order under Article 49 of the Bangladesh Constitution, according to a gazette issued by the home ministry on 6 August. Article 49 states that “The president shall have power to grant pardons, reprieves, and respites and to remit, suspend, or commute any sentence passed by any court, tribunal, or other authority.