Lebanese Islamist leader freed by Syria

A Lebanese Islamist leader has been freed from a Syrian jail after being detained for fifteen years without charge.

The man, Sheikh Hashem Minkara, was released from Sidnaya prison, north of Damascus, as a result of mediation by a Lebanese government minister.

Sheikh Hashem was detained with dozens of other people by Syrian troops when they entered Tripoli in 1985; at the time he was a local leader of the Islamic Tawheed movement.

A Lebanese human rights group said that for years, the Lebanese and Syrian governments had denied his existence. In June, the human rights group Amnesty International called on Damascus to free more than a thousand political prisoners including Jordanians, Lebanese, Kurds, Syrian communists and Muslim fundamentalists.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service