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International

01 May, 2023

1156

A journalist from the Al Jazeera network has been freed in Egypt, four years after he was arrested, the Qatari media organisation says.

Hisham Abdel Aziz was detained in 2019, reportedly on suspicion of belonging to a terrorist group. He was subsequently freed then rearrested.

The broadcaster quoted Aziz's family as saying he was back at home in Cairo.

He is one of several Al Jazeera staff arrested in Egypt since the current leadership came to power in 2013. In July of that year, the then-Islamist president, Mohammed Morsi, was overthrown by the military following mass protests.

Rights groups say that since then tens of thousands of people have been arrested in a crackdown on dissent. Many have been accused of links to the banned Islamist Muslim Brotherhood movement, which Egypt has accused Al Jazeera of supporting.