Egyptian journalist and Islamist politician Magdi Hussein was released on Monday after serving a five-year jail sentence he received in 2016, the Egyptian Journalists Syndicate has announced.

Hussein was convicted of promoting extremist thought, harming national unity and disseminating false news to disrupt national peace.

He received an eight-year prison sentence during a trial in absentia in 2013 before it was reduced to five years in a retrial in 2016.

The writer, who was arrested in 2014, was head of the Islamist-oriented Istiqlal Party and a leading member of the now-banned pro-Morsi National Coalition in Support of Legitimacy.

Hussein, a pro-Muslim Brotherhood politician, was elected in 1999 as a member of the Journalists Syndicate's board.

Head of the Journalists Syndicate Diaa Rashwan has hailed Hussein’s release and expressed wishes for the release of other journalists held in pre-trial detention so they can spend the rest of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan with their families.

At least 27 journalists are still imprisoned, some of whom are members of the syndicate, according to Journalists Syndicate's figures.

Since the beginning of Ramadan, three journalists who had been in pre-trial detention were released.