Detained Ugandan opposition figure Kizza Besigye, on hunger strike for a week, has been returned to prison after being in a health clinic overnight, his allies have said.
The 68-year-old was rushed to a private medical facility in a prison ambulance as his health was deteriorating, his lawyer Erias Lukwago wrote earlier on Facebook.
Besigye was charged in a military court with illegal possession of a firearm, threatening national security, as well as treachery, which carries the death sentence. He denies the accusations.
The news about his health came hours after a cabinet minister said he had visited Besigye in jail and urged him to resume eating while pledging to drop his military trial.
The veteran politician, who has run for president against long-serving leader Yoweri Museveni four times, has been in detention since he was dramatically abducted in Kenya in November and taken back to Uganda to face a military trial.
Last month, the Supreme Court ruled that trying civilians in military courts was unconstitutional.
The government had insisted Besigye’s military trial would go on and President Museveni dismissed the ruling as “a wrong decision”, vowing to challenge it.
But on Sunday, Information Minister Chris Baryomunsi said he had seen Besigye in prison “in the presence of his doctors” and had asked him to end the hunger strike “as the government fast-tracks the transfer of his case from a court martial to a civil court”.
—BBC
