‘Ibrahim will be allowed return home’

Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney has said that he will insist on Egypt honouring an agreement to allow Ibrahim Halawa return to Ireland whether or not he is found guilty following his trial in Cairo.

Mr Coveney said the Government had received assurances that Ibrahim would be allowed home, either as a free man or to serve a sentence here. He told Newstalk radio he expected that agreement to be fulfilled.

He was speaking as Ibrahim, from Firhouse in Dublin, marked his fourth year in detention in Egypt following his arrest during anti-government protests in Cairo where he was holidaying with relatives while waiting for his Leaving Certificate results in 2013.