Former Israeli President and Noble Peace Prize winner Shimon Peres remains in a critical condition 24 hours after suffering a massive stroke, but is showing signs of improvement, his doctors said on Wednesday.

Peres, 93, is still sedated and on a respirator, said Yitshak Kreiss, director of the Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv. But he is “a bit more aware” and “we can see some improvement”, Kreiss told reporters.

“We are trying to reduce some of the sedation in order to evaluate him, and that’s a good sign,” he said.

Peres’ son-in-law and personal physician Rafi Valdan said earlier in the day it was too soon to tell whether there was lasting neurological damage from the stroke that afflicted the right side of Peres’ brain, but the broader health indicators were good.

“There is another real improvement today,” Walden told Agence France Presse, describing his condition as serious but stable.

He said it was likely his condition would remain that way for the coming days.

Peres, former president and prime minister, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 along with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat for his role in negotiating the Oslo accords.

He has had minor health problems over the past year while maintaining a busy public schedule.

He held regular meetings on Tuesday and appeared in “perfect condition”, Valdan said, before suffering headaches.

He was taken to hospital for an examination and then suffered what Valdan described as a “massive stroke”.