Lawyer Hisham El-Gaili told AFP that his client, the former Minister of Cabinet Affairs, “has been released.”
A security force had arrested Youssef on February 9, the day after he met in Khartoum with the United Nations envoy to Sudan, Volker Peretz, as part of consultations that the UN envoy was conducting in an attempt to put the transitional train back on track.
Youssef is a leader in the Forces of Freedom and Change, the most prominent civil political alliance in the country.
The measures implemented on October 25 by army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan ended a fragile power-sharing agreement between the military and civilians that the two sides reached after the overthrow of former President Omar al-Bashir in 2019, following popular protests against his three-decade rule.
Other leaders of the “Forces of Freedom and Change” remain behind bars, including Mohamed El-Faki, a former member of the Sovereignty Council, the country’s highest transitional authority, and Wagdy Saleh, the coalition’s spokesman.
Al-Faki and Saleh were members of the “Removal of Empowerment” committee tasked with recovering assets seized by the Bashir regime. The committee recently became a target due to accusations of embezzlement of funds, which the members of this committee deny.
In early April, Al-Burhan promised to release political detainees in preparation for a dialogue between the various Sudanese parties. He also pledged to ease the emergency measures approved after October 25.
Since these measures, thousands of Sudanese have demonstrated regularly throughout the country. 94 protesters were killed by the security forces.
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