Egyptian journalist released in Sudan

An Egyptian journalist detained in Khartoum for nearly two weeks has been freed, a Sudanese government official said on Monday.

Shaimaa Adil had been held since July 3 during a clampdown sparked by anti-regime protests.

"Yes, released," Rabbie Abdelatti Ebaid, a senior member of the ruling National Congress Party, told AFP, referring to Adil.

"According to my information, released, after the meeting between the president of Egypt and President Bashir in Addis Ababa."
Ebaid, who is also an adviser to the minister of information, had no further details.

Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi "requested" for Adil's release during talks with his Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Bashir on the sidelines of the African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital, Sudan's official news agency SUNA quoted Khartoum's Foreign Minister Ali Karti as saying late Sunday.

Karti added that Bashir "promised the Egyptian president to release her."

Adil had been detained for allegedly violating immigration laws, SUNA said.

The official Sudanese Journalists' Union said last week that Adil, of Egypt's Al-Watan newspaper, and Marwa al-Tegani, a Sudanese journalist detained at the same time, should be either freed or brought before a court for charges to be filed.

On Sunday the union said it was still demanding that Tegani also be freed.

The crackdown coincides with scattered anti-government protests, sparked by high inflation, that began on June 16.

An Egyptian correspondent for international news wire Bloomberg was deported in late June after being detained while trying to cover the protest movement in Sudan.

Also in June, security agents held an AFP correspondent for 14 hours without charge after he spoke to students and took pictures at the University of Khartoum where the demonstrations originated.

(AFP, Al-Akhbar)