Togo's ex-prime minister freed after market fire

Former Togo prime minister and opposition figure Agbeyome Kodjo, on June 19, 2012, in Lome. By Emile Kouton (AFP/File)

LOME (AFP) - Togo's ex-prime minister and key opposition figure Agbeyome Kodjo, arrested last month in connection with fires that razed two markets, said Tuesday he was freed after being "tortured".

"I was released on Monday night at 11.45 pm. I am very weak because I am sick. I had been physically and psychologically tortured", Kodjo told AFP.

He denied having been "closely or remotely involved" in the fires that razed the main markets in the capital Lome and in Kara (420 kilometres/ 263 miles north of Lome) last month.

A government panel has estimated the losses at six billion Togolese CFA franc (nine million euros).

The government has slammed the incidents as "criminal acts".

Twenty-four people, including several opposition members, were arrested in the aftermath of the fire.

Kodjo, the only one to be freed so far, has served in the government of former president Gnassingbe Eyadema as president of the National Assembly (1999-2000) and later as prime minister (2000-2002).

He later went into the opposition, heading the OBUTS group.

Eyadema ruled the country for 38 years with an iron fist until his death in 2005, after which the military installed his son, Faure Gnassingbe, in power.

The junior Gnassingbe has since won elections in 2005 and 2010, although the opposition disputes these victories.