Hosni Mubarak Released from Jail

Egypt’s ousted President Hosni Mubarak has been released from jail, six years after being overthrown.

Hosni Mubarak, 88, left a military hospital in southern Cairo and went to his home in the northern suburb of Heliopolis, his lawyer said.

The former was ordered freed earlier this month after Egypt’s top appeals court cleared him over the deaths of protesters in the 2011 uprising.

Hosni Mubarak became president in 1981 after Anwar Sadat’s assassination.

He had been at Maadi Military Hospital since 2013, when he was transferred there on bail from Torah prison.

Hosni Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison after being convicted in 2012 of complicity in the killing of protesters who died at the hands of security forces in February, 2011.

Another trial was held and a judge decreed in May 2015 that Hosni Mubarak could be released from detention.

However, the government of President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi was reportedly reluctant to free Hosni Mubarak because of the public backlash that might accompany such a move.

Abdul Fattah al-Sisi served as Hosni Mubarak’s military intelligence chief and led the military’s overthrow of his democratically elected successor, Mohamed Morsi, in 2013.

In all, more than 800 people are believed to have been killed as security forces clashed with protesters in Cairo, Alexandria, Suez and other cities around Egypt during the 18-day uprising that forced Hosni Mubarak to resign.