Pakistan releases Mumbai attacks suspect on court order

Pakistan on Friday released a key suspect in the 2008 attacks in the Indian commercial hub of Mumbai, his lawyers said.

A court had earlier ordered the release of Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, a leader of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa group, in December, however, the government had kept him in detention in other cases.

Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, a leader of Jamaat-ud-Dawa, was among the seven accused Pakistan has taken into custody after the attacks which killed 166 people and injured many others.

Lakhvi was suspected of planning and helping carry out the attacks, the charges he has denied.

Jamaat-ud-Dawa's spokesman, Yahya Mujahid, confirmed Lakhvi's release.

"Lakhvi is out of a jail in Rawalpindi," Mujahid told the media. Lakhvi's defence lawyer, Malik Nasir Abbasi also said his client is now a free man.

India had also angrily reacted when a court ordered Lakhvi's release in December. The government then put him under house arrest, a decision he had challenged in the Islamabad High Court.

At the time of the attacks, Lakhvi was believed to be the operational head of the banned Laskhar-i-Taiba (LT) that has been accused by India of carrying out the attacks in India's financial capital.

Lakhvi is the first accused to get bail in the highly publicized case. India has been urging Pakistan to expedite the trial.

The trial began in 2009 in an anti-terrorism court in the city of Rawalpindi and the case was later transferred to Islamabad. Endi