A convicted Australian fraudster who cut his head on a boat propeller as he tried to escape police in Fiji will be discharged from hospital on Monday, a doctor said yesterday.
Peter Foster, 44, has been handcuffed and under police guard at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital in the Fijian capital Suva since he was admitted with head injuries on Wednesday, Dr Ifeireini Waqainabete said.
Police had been hunting him for three weeks before his capture near Suva on Wednesday. They said that Foster cut his head on a boat propeller after diving into a river in an attempt to flee arresting officers.
Foster, who gained notoriety for promoting fake slimming products and dating 1980s British glamor model Samantha Fox, is a suspect in three criminal investigations involving international fraud, spreading false information and immigration violations.
"We decided that we'll keep him over the weekend, and he'll be discharged formally on Monday," said Waqainabete, who is treating Foster.
Fijian police agreed to let Foster remain in hospital until Monday before questioning him, even though doctors said he was fit enough to be discharged.
A doctor treating Foster said it was agreed he could recuperate at the hospital over the weekend, as he had nowhere else to stay.
Separately, Foster's lawyer said he plans to file a complaint against the police that they assaulted Foster after his arrest this week.
"He says that he was assaulted," Mehboob Raza told reporters in Suva. "I've got all the faith in the police force that they'll do the proper investigation."
Raza did not provide details of the alleged assault.
Foster has served jail terms in Australia, Britain and the US, mostly for fraud convictions. He once advised Cherie Blair, wife of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, in a property transaction.
Although there was never any suggestion the deal was illegal, she had to apologize after trying to cover up the extent of her dealings with the Australian.
Earlier this month, Fiji Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase asked his Home Affairs Minister how Foster had managed to slip into the country even though he has been barred since 2002.
Fiji's Immigration Department terminated Foster's work permit last week.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
The pitch is a classic: A young celebrity with no climbing experience spends a year in hard training and scales Mount Everest, succeeding against some — if not all — odds. French YouTuber Ines Benazzouz, known as Inoxtag, brought the story to life with a two-hour-plus documentary about his year preparing for the ultimate challenge. The film, titled Kaizen, proved a smash hit on its release last weekend. Young fans queued around the block to get into a preview screening in Paris, with Inoxtag’s management on Monday saying the film had smashed the box office record for a special cinema
RSS