News
‘Please let me go to my country for heart surgery’
The ailing Ukrainian captain of the ‘Avant Garde’ vessel–in remand since October 2015–is pleading with the Supreme Court to let him travel to Ukraine to treat a serious heart disease.
Gennadiy Ivanovych Gavrylov collapsed in court earlier this month after learning that his next hearing will be next year. The Supreme Court earlier granted him leave to proceed with a fundamental rights petition challenging his alleged illegal arrest and prolonged detention. He is now at the Galle remand prison.
In an affidavit filed in court this week, he said he was shocked and dismayed upon hearing he will possibly not be able to return to Ukraine till after March 12, next year. He was rushed to a private hospital with severe chest pain and thereafter diagnosed with triple vessel coronary artery disease. Doctors said he would need coronary artery bypass surgery without delay. Copies of medical reports were presented to court.
Mr Gavrylov says he was at present unemployed and unemployable due to bail conditions imposed by the Galle High Court which confined his movements to the Galle city area. Holding a job would also violate his visa conditions. Therefore, he could not possibly raise sufficient funds to meet medical expenses incurred for the surgery.
But his family and friends would be able to raise funds for the procedures to be performed in Britain, Mr Gavrylov’s affidavit states. He requests the court to vary the terms of his release “for the limited purpose of enabling me to return to Ukraine to undergo the said urgent and necessary medical treatment”.
The captain also says that his mother (78) and mother-in-law (80) are in need of “urgent and continuous medical care, which I am unable to provide, under my present state of unemployment”. His family, particularly his wife, tends to the needs of both. This meant that they were unable to travel to Sri Lanka to provide care and support to him.
Mr Gavrylov has requested the court to advance the date fixed for hearing of the application, thus enabling him to resume employment and provide financial care and support to his family. He pleads for the terms of bail imposed on him by the Galle High Court to be varied to permit his travel to Ukraine for the limited purpose of undergoing medical treatment.
The captain has given “a solemn and express undertaking” to court that he will return to Sri Lanka after surgery if the Attorney General required to prosecute him.
Mr Gavrylov is the first foreigner to file a fundamental rights application in Sri Lanka under Article 11, Article 12(1), Article 13(1) and Article 13(20) of the constitution. The father of one said in his petition that he was unfortunate to be embroiled in a political tug-of-war in the country.