MANAMA - Bahrain's king has pardoned 178 detainees accused of security offences, including a group of Shiites charged with trying to overthrow the state, officials said.
The amnesty by King Hamad bin Issa al-Khalifa was announced by Interior Minister Sheikh Rashed bin Abdullah al-Khalifa in a statement carried by the official news agency BNA on Saturday.
It did not give details of those freed but a Bahraini official said they included 35 Shiite opposition activists who have been on trial since February accused of attempting to overthrow the Sunni-led regime.
Among the leading activists freed were Hassan Mesheima, head of the Shiite-dominated opposition Haq (right) movement, Shiite cleric Mohammed al-Moqdad and Haq spokesman Abdeljalil al-Singace.
More than 1,500 Bahrainis staged protests in February demanding their release and rights groups complained that their trial was flawed.
The official said the pardon included prominent rights campaigner Abdul Hadi al-Khawaja, who was accused in February of "inciting hatred against the regime and spreading rumours to disrupt security," in the tiny Gulf archipelago.
Khawaja was sentenced to one year in prison in 2004 on similar charges but immediately pardoned by the king.
Haq was established in 2005 as a splinter group of the Islamic National Accord Association, the main Shiite political formation Bahrain, which is led by a Sunni dynasty although most of the population is Shiite.
Bahrain was plagued in the 1990s by a wave of Shiite-led unrest which has abated since the authorities launched steps to convert the Gulf country into a constitutional monarchy.
Weak dollar may feed inflation in GCC