Egypt releases Al-Jazeera journalists on bail

CAIRO -- Canadian Al-Jazeera journalist Mohamed Fahmy was released from jail in Egypt on Friday, his family said, after being held for more than a year with two colleagues on terror-related charges, and pending retrial in a case denounced as a sham by rights groups and the international community.

Fahmy's brother tweeted that he posted $33,000 bail following a court decision to allow him to walk free.

Fahmy's colleague, Al-Jazeera journalist Baher Mohammed, was also released on bail, reports CBS News' Alex Ortiz.

Fahmy spent more than 400 days in detention after he was charged with terrorism for providing the Muslim Brotherhood, now declared a terrorist organization, with a platform. His next court hearing is Feb. 23 and he has to check in at a police station every day until then.

Australian Peter Greste, who was tried with his two colleagues, was deported to Australia two weeks ago.

Fahmy, is also seeking deportation. He renounced his Egyptian citizenship to be eligible for deportation to Canada, where he also holds citizenship.

Fahmy's release came after a Cairo appeals court ordered him and Mohammed freed on bail Thursday. If authorities aim to eventually exonerate both of them - along with Greste and a dozen others prosecuted on the same charges in the case - their strategy for doing so remains murky and slow as they apparently seek a face-saving way out of a legal process that has drawn international criticism of Egyptian justice.

But Thursday's decision indicated the court was moving ahead with a retrial of Fahmy and Mohammed.

The decision was greeted with tears of joy and relief by their relatives in the Cairo courtroom.

Al-Jazeera called the decision "a small step in the right direction" but said the court should dismiss "this absurd case" and release both journalists unconditionally."

The three journalists, who worked for Al-Jazeera's English-language channel, were arrested in December 2013 and accused of belonging to the Brotherhood, which was branded a terrorist organization after the military ousted President Mohammed Morsi earlier that year.

Since the ouster, Egypt has been cracking down heavily on Morsi's supporters, and the journalists were accused of being mouthpieces for the Brotherhood and falsifying footage to suggest that Egypt faces civil war. They rejected the charges against them, saying they were simply reporting the news.

The journalists were convicted by a lower court on terrorism-related charges and sentenced to at least seven years in prison. The Court of Cassation, in ordering a retrial, said their conviction was based on "flawed evidence" and that the trial was marred by violations of the defendants' rights, according to details of its ruling made public this week.

President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi had rejected calls from the United States and other Western governments to pardon or commute the sentences. In July, he acknowledged that the heavy sentences had a "very negative" impact on his country's reputation and that he wished they had never been put on trial.