 (photo: AP / Amr Nabil) |
Hassan al-Turabi, 76, was freed from prison in Port Sudan in the early hours on Monday and flown to his home in the capital Khartoum according to his family.
"My father has been freed from the Port-Sudan prison. They took him by plane and he is now at home", his daughter Omama al-Turabi told AFP.
Her brother Siddig said: "We don't know what is going to happen in the morning but there is no guard outside the house in Khartoum. He has been released ... We are very happy."
Mr Turabi was arrested by Sudanese security officers on January 14, two days after he urged Mr al-Bashir to surrender to the ICC, saying the he thought the President was "politically culpable" for war crimes in Darfur.
Mr Turabi, a close ally of Mr al-Bashir until they split in a power struggle in 1999-2000, said that he should hand himself in to save Sudan from the sanctions and political turmoil that would follow if he defied the court.
"Politically we think he is culpable," he said. "He should assume responsibility for whatever is happening in Darfur, displacement, burning all the villages, rapes, I mean systematic rapes, continuously, I mean on a wide scale and the killing."
Omama al-Turabi said that the family had asked that Mr Turabi be released because of health concerns after he fell ill with flu. After his release his family said that he appeared well but had lost weight.
Mr Turabi, the leader of the Islamist Popular Congress Party and a central figure in Sudan for decades, was a leading force behind the Islamist-inspired bloodless coup in 1989 that swept Mr al-Bashir to power but now the men are bitter enemies.
He was the only political figure inside Sudan to call on Mr al-Bashir to surrender to the ICC. Since the ICC issued an arrest warrant last week, Mr al-Bashir has appeared at rallies warning that he would expel anyone who got in the way of his Government.
On Sunday, brandishing a sword at a rally in Darfur, he threatened to expel diplomats and more aid groups.
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