Egypt's president has pardoned prominent British-Egyptian activist Alaa Abdel Fattah, who has been imprisoned for six years, according to state media and his lawyer.
Abdel Fattah is among six individuals whose sentences President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi commuted following a request from the National Council for Human Rights, as reported by Al-Qahera News. His lawyer confirmed the news, expressing relief on social media by stating, Praise be to God.
The 43-year-old blogger and pro-democracy advocate is one of Egypt's most recognized political prisoners. He was arrested in 2019, merely months after completing a previous five-year sentence, and was convicted in 2021 of spreading false news for sharing a Facebook post that described torture practices in Egypt.
While he was expected to be released in September 2024, authorities did not consider the more than two years he spent in pre-trial detention towards his overall time served. In an act of defiance, he and his mother, Laila Soueif, underwent hunger strikes to protest his imprisonment.
