Doctors treating former Indonesian dictator Suharto said yesterday he could be released from intensive care within a couple days after breathing on his own and beating back a blood infection.
The 86-year-old has been in the hospital for three weeks, suffering from multiple organ failure, pneumonia and sepsis, a potentially lethal blood infection that is particularly dangerous for the elderly and critically ill patients.
Although his condition has fluctuated wildly and he was still receiving blood transfusions and kidney dialysis, his physicians were "optimistic" he will soon be out of critical condition, said Marjo Subiandono, head of the presidential medical team.
Suharto, who ruled Indonesia for 32 years until being toppled by a pro-democracy uprising in 1998, was rushed to a hospital with anemia and a dangerously low heart rate on Jan. 4.
His health deteriorated rapidly a week ago, when he briefly stopped breathing and doctors said he had been close to death several times.
He was being fed through a tube, his lungs filled with fluid and sepsis spread through his body.
But his condition took a sudden upturn this week when he ate on his own, spoke in a whisper and began moving his arms.
Doctors spoke of an "amazing recovery."
"By this morning he was breathing entirely on his own," Dr Christian Johannes said.
Suharto, who led a regime widely regarded as one of the 20th century's most brutal and corrupt, has lived a reclusive life in a comfortable villa in downtown Jakarta for the past decade.
Historians say up to 800,000 alleged communist sympathizers were killed during his rise to power from 1965 to 1968.
His troops were responsible for another 300,000 deaths in military operations against independence movements in Papua, Aceh and East Timor.
No one has been punished over the killings.
Corruption watchdog Transparency International has said Suharto and his family amassed billions of dollars in stolen state funds, allegations they are fighting in court.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
CARGO PLANE VECTOR: Officials said they believe that attacks involving incendiary devices on planes was the work of Russia’s military intelligence agency the GRU Western security officials suspect Russian intelligence was behind a plot to put incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes headed to North America, including one that caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another that ignited in a warehouse in England. Poland last month said that it had arrested four people suspected to be linked to a foreign intelligence operation that carried out sabotage and was searching for two others. Lithuania’s prosecutor general Nida Grunskiene on Tuesday said that there were an unspecified number of people detained in several countries, offering no elaboration. The events come as Western officials say
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
RSS