An Egyptian court on Thursday ordered the release of Al Jazeera journalist, Mahmoud Hussein after being detained for more than two years, legal sources said.
Hussein, an Egyptian national, was arrested in December 2016 when he was on a holiday in Egypt.
At the time, Egyptian authorities accused him of spreading false news and belonging to the now-banned Muslim Brotherhood.
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On Thursday, the Cairo Criminal Court ordered his release under “precautionary measures’’ that include placing him on probation, the sources said without details.
Egypt has repeatedly accused Al Jazeera of biased coverage and being a mouthpiece of the Muslim Brotherhood, charges that the Qatari television network has denied.
Egyptian authorities have arrested hundreds of Islamists and secular activists since the army’s 2013 overthrow of democratically elected-but-divisive president Mohammed Morsi, a Brotherhood official, following mass protests against him. (NAN)
