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Sierra Leone's former military ruler Valentine Strasser has been flown to Ghana for medical treatment.

He is being treated for a gunshot wound to his left leg, sustained in the 1990s when he was fighting rebels, tweets Sierra Leone reporter Umaru Fofana.

President Julius Maada Bio visited him in hospital last weekend and promised that Sierra Leone's government would support his treatment as Sierra Leone did not have the vascular surgeon needed for the operation.

President Bio was Capt Strasser’s deputy after a group of soldiers overthrew the government in 1992.

But in January 1996, he staged a palace coup, arguing that Capt Strasser wanted to renege on the promised handover to an elected civilian government.

Until recently Mr Strasser, 51, had been operating a community computer centre at his village a few miles from the capital, Freetown.

The story has prompted some on Twitter to consider the twist Mr Strasser's life has taken