Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak sits inside a cage in a courtroom at the police academy in Cairo April 13, 2013. (Photo: Reuters)
A Cairo appeal court accepted on Wednesday an appeal by former president Hosni Mubarak against a recent detention order he received, setting him free.
However, the court said Mubarak will be held for 48 hours to give the prosecution a chance to consider whether it will appeal the decision to release him or not.
A judicial source told Ahram Online that the proscution will probably not appeal the release order.
The former president is due to appear in court on 25 August to appeal detention pending his retrial on charges he was responsible for the murder of protesters during the 25 January revolution.
A team of judges from the Northern Cairo misdemeanour court arrived earlier on Wednesday to Tora Prison, where Mubarak is detained in hospital, to look into the appeal.
Mubarak, who has been on trial since August 2011, has now received release orders in all the cases in which he is investigated, for spending the maximum time in jail for a defendant pending trial. However, all trials are still ongoing.
On Wednesday, he was released pending investigations in a corruption case in which he is accused of illegally receiving millions of pounds worth of gifts from state-run publisher Al-Ahram.
Mubarak has recently reimbursed money equivalent to the value of the gifts to the state, which raised the possibility of him being released.
On Monday, he was released pending trial in one of the corruption charges he faces, drawing him closer to release as the number of charges decreases.
Mubarak is currently retried in a case for charges of complicity in the killing of over 800 protesters in the January 2011 uprising, after his appeal on a life sentence was accepted.
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