A founding member of al-Gamaa al-Islamiyya, Egypt's most militant Islamic group, has been freed after spending seven months in prison, his lawyer said Friday.
Salah Hashem was released Thursday, a day before a scheduled court appearance to decide on renewing his detention, according to his lawyer, Montasser al-Zayat.
Another al-Gamaa figure, lawyer Ali Rady, also was freed.
Al-Zayat said he had no details on why they were released, and there was no immediate confirmation from authorities.
Hashem helped found Al-Gamaa al-Islamiyya, Arabic for the Islamic Group, in the 1970s, and was tried in absentia for an alleged role in assassinating President Anwar Sadat in 1981.
Rady was also tried in absentia on several counts, including trying to revive the group. Neither man was ever convicted.
Al-Gamaa was Egypt's most active militant group in trying to topple the secular government during the 1990s and replace it with strict Islamic rule. More than 1,200 people, mostly militants and police, were killed.
Hashem was one of the first militants to renounce the violence.
The group's top jailed leaders approved a cease-fire in 1997 after militants linked to the group massacred 58 tourists in the southern town of Luxor. After the cease-fire, the government released several thousand militants.
Police arrested Hashem and Rady in June. They were accused of attempting to break the cease-fire by passing orders from members abroad to jailed members. Authorities also accused them of receiving foreign funds, Al-Zayat said.