(ANSA) - TBILISI, NOV 20 - Former Georgian president MikheilSaakashvili today put an end to his 50 days of hunger strike in detention, after being transferred to a military hospital. His doctor made it known.
"Saakashvili officially stopped his hunger strike, immediately after being transferred to the Gori military hospital", about 90 kilometers west of the capital Tbilisi, "in critical condition and was admitted to an intensive care unit," said the Dr. NikolozKipshidze.
The former Georgian president (2004-2013) stopped eating on 1 October to protest his imprisonment on his return to Tbilisi after years of exile in Ukraine. Thursday he passed out during a meeting with his lawyers. Georgian authorities initially rejected doctors' recommendations to admit him to a civilian institution, before changing their minds yesterday and moving him to a military hospital overnight. Thousands of supporters of Saakashvili, 53, took to the streets last night in the capital to ask for guarantees of adequate medical care for the former president of the Caucasus country, currently considered the leader of the opposition.
The Minister of Justice, Rati Bregadzé, yesterday accused the opposition of "exploiting Saakachvili's health for his own ridiculous political ends".
Dr Guiorgui Grigolia, who examined Saakashvili on Thursday after his illness, said that his "life was in danger" and that he should "be transferred without delay to a civilian clinic", citing the patient's cardiac and neurological problems.
(HANDLE).