A leading Chadian rebel flew home on Friday to join talks on the country's political future, after spending nearly two years in jail in Egypt, an AFP reporter saw. Tom Erdimi, 67, arrived at N'Djamena airport aboard an EgyptAir flight and was greeted by his twin brother, Timan Erdimi, who leads the Union of Resistance Forces (UFR). The brothers -- nephews of Chad's iron-fisted late president Idriss Deby Itno -- were key figures in the regime in the 1990s before they rebelled against it, co-founding the UFR. Erdimi was arrested in Egypt in December 2020, a move that the UFR said was the result of Chadian pressure on the Cairo government. But on Wednesday, the Chadian government announced that he had been pardoned by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi and would be returning home.

Source: Ethiopian News September 17, 2022 07:45 UTC