Parti Rakyat Keadilan (PKR) today urged Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to lift the veil of secrecy over jailed ex-deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim's medical record on his back injury.

Anwar had claimed he suffered the injury after he was blindfolded and beaten by then-police chief Rahim Noor in September 1998.

"The government is keeping the medical record a secret. Abdullah must lift the secrecy," PKR youth chief Ezam Mohamad Noor told AFP .

Keadilan is led by Anwar's wife Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, a lawmaker.

Ezam made the demand after Anwar was taken to hospital on Monday and Tuesday having complained of kidney pains for the first time.

Anwar had lamented to his lawyers that he had difficulty urinating and there was blood in it, he said.

New concerns

Anwar's counsel Sankara Nair said that despite formal applications to KL General Hospital and to the health ministry for his medical record, the authorities opted to remain silent .

"My reading is they have stonewalled the application," he said.

Sankara said he met Anwar last Friday and the one-time heir apparent to former Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad was in "great pain".

Wan Azizah said she was concerned about Anwar's health condition. "The kidney pain is new. We are worried about it since it could be related to his back injury," she told AFP .

Charismatic and popular Anwar has already been in jail for more than five years, having completed a sentence for corruption and begun serving a nine-year term for sodomy.

Strongman Mahathir sacked his deputy in 1998 and Anwar was later jailed on charges he says were trumped up to prevent him from making a challenge for the premiership.

The conduct of the trial was widely condemned internationally, and Anwar is considered a political prisoner by human rights groups and the United States. - AFP