Former Bangladesh PM Khaleda Zia visits US embassy to apply for visa

Dhaka: Former Bangladesh prime minister and BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia on Wednesday visited the US embassy here to complete her visa application process, according to a media report.

Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) insiders said that all the necessary arrangements have been made to send the 79-year-old former prime minister abroad for specialised treatment, The Daily Star newspaper said.

The BNP chief went to the US embassy in the afternoon from her Gulshan office to provide her fingerprints to complete her visa application process, her party’s media cell member Sayrul Kabir Khan said.

According to her party sources, Zia is expected to travel to the United Kingdom early next month and from there, she may seek advanced medical care in either the United States or Germany.

She has been battling multiple serious health issues, including liver cirrhosis, heart, lung, kidney, and eye problems.

Bangladesh High Court on Wednesday acquitted Zia in a corruption case in which she was sentenced to seven years in jail by a lower court.

Zia was convicted in the Zia Charitable Trust corruption case in 2018 by a Dhaka court. It also sentenced her to seven years imprisonment under the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina's Awami League government and fined her Tk 1 million.

A bench of Justices AKM Asaduzzaman and Syed Enayet Hossain overturned the decision based on an appeal by Zia, the bdnews24.com news portal reported.

On August 6, after the regime change in Dhaka, Zia was completely freed by an order of Bangladesh President Mohammed Shahabuddin.

Zia served as the prime minister of Bangladesh from March 1991 to March 1996, and again from June 2001 to October 2006.