President Asif Ali Zardari was having tests related to a heart condition in a Dubai hospital Wednesday but is expected to return to Pakistan within days, officials said, denying rumors that the embattled and unpopular leader may be stepping down.
Some reports said Zardari, who in September underwent medical tests for a cardiac condition in Britain, may have suffered a mild heart attack. Those were also denied by officials, some of whom suggested the rumors were being spread by political enemies of Zardari seeking to create crisis-like conditions that could help in moves to topple him.
Dr. Asim Hussain, a government minister and close aide to Zardari, said the president was being kept in the intensive care unit of the hospital not because his condition required it, "but to keep him away from frequent visitors if he had been kept in a normal room."
"He will be discharged from hospital and come back to the country in at the most three to four days," he told a local television station from Dubai, where he was with the president. "All his tests are normal, but still there are more to be carried out, which may take another 48 hours." |