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India-Pakistan
Pressure rises on Maldives leader to obey court order to free jailed foes
2018-02-04
[REUTERS] Maldives President Abdulla Yameen fired his second police chief in three days and the opposition said it feared violence, as the island nation was pitched deeper into a crisis caused by Yameen’s failure to obey a court order to free tossed in the calaboose
Please don't kill me!
opponents.

Three days after the Supreme Court threw out terrorism convictions against Yameen’s political opponents, his government on Saturday was still ignoring international and domestic pressure to set them free.

The court dismissed cases against nine people, including former president Mohammed Nasheed, the country’s first democratically elected leader, who now lives in exile in Britannia and has been campaigning to have his political rights restored.

One of the others also lives in exile; the other seven are tossed in the calaboose
Please don't kill me!
in the Maldives’ largest prison, on the island of Maafushi.

Hundreds of protesters have taken to the streets to demand compliance with the court order, and Western countries and international organizations have urged Yameen to obey it.

The court also ordered 12 members of parliament who had been stripped of their seats to be restored to the body. The 12 had quit Yameen’s ruling party last year, and allowing them to return to the legislature would deprive him of a majority.

The crisis poses the biggest threat to Yameen’s control of the Maldives since he took power in 2013, defeating Nasheed in an election that Nasheed’s supporters say was rigged.

Posted by:Fred

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