Bhutto 'has gone on hunger strike’

Press, 22 May 1978, Page 8

Bhutto ' has gone on hunger strike’

NZPA Islamabad (Pakistan) > The former Pakistani ’ Prime Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, sentenced to death last March 16 for conspiracy to murder, has been on a hunger strike since last ' Wednesday in protest over his prison conditions, his I lawyer, Yahya Bakhtiar, has said. Mr Bakhtiar was speaking ; after meeting the former 1 I Prime Minister for the first |time since Bhutto’s transfer! Hast Wednesday from a La-|| here to a Rawalpindi prison. ' Mr Bhutto’s appeal aginst; the Lahore death sentence opened before the Rawal-i' pindi Supreme Court on Sat-;' urday. The appeal is ex-; pected to last se ; pected to last several; months, observers said. According to Mr Bakhtiar,! Bhutto has been drinking:

only tea and has refused all other nourishment since last Wednesday’s transfer. Bhutto, who had been sick in Lahore, had lost between 12kg and 15kg since his arrest and was in a weak and depressed condition but retained the “will to live and fight.” Mr Bakhtiar said. He added that Bhutto was depressed by the deliberately “humiliating attitude” of the prison authorities to him. Mr Bakhtiar said that the (former Prime Minister was (watched day and night in (bis cell bv" five guards in i the corridor outside. The , lavatories were in another (cell, but were not isolated I from the corridor. Bhutto was allowed the ; minimum one-hour daily I walk, not in an outer courtiyard but in the corridor outIside his cell, Mr Bakhtiar added.