Extract from ABC News
Updated
Photo:
Peter Greste was greeted with cheers from supporters a short time after arriving back in Australia. (ABC News)
Australian journalist Peter Greste says he is
"ecstatic" to be home after arriving at Brisbane airport following his
400-day prison ordeal in Egypt.
Greste held a private family
reunion after disembarking from his flight before walking out with his
hands raised to cheers from supporters.The Al Jazeera journalist, who was jailed along with two colleagues accused of aiding the blacklisted Muslim Brotherhood, was deported from Egypt by presidential decree on Sunday.
Greste told waiting media in Brisbane that he was "very, very happy" to be home with his family after his 13-month detention.
"I can't tell you how ecstatic I am to be here this is a moment," he said.
"I have rehearsed in my mind at least 400 times over the past 400 days and it feels absolutely awesome to be here with my family.
"My family have been the bedrock through all this. My family have been absolutely awesome. I couldn't have done this without them.
"All I've done is sit in a cell and write a couple of letters. They've been the ones to drive this and to be back with them and celebrate this with them has meant the world."
Greste said, however, that celebrating his freedom was bittersweet given his colleagues - Canadian-Egyptian Mohamed Fahmy and Egyptian national Baher Mohamed - remained in a Cairo prison.
"This is all tempered - and I'm going to say this a million times - this is all tempered by a real worry for my colleagues," he said.
"If it's right for me to be free, then it's right for all of us.
"So I think this is an opportunity. This has generated an enormous amount of goodwill, right across Australia, right around the world, and I think that Egypt now has an opportunity to show that justice doesn't depend on your nationality."
Juris Greste, who along with wife Lois fought to keep media attention on the case, said seeing his son's return was "like holding him for the first time".
Egyptian police arrested the three journalists amid a diplomatic row between Cairo and Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera.
Fahmy surrendered his Egyptian passport as a necessary first step for him to be released and deported as a foreign national to Canada under a decree issued by president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in November.
Their jailing sparked a global outcry and proved a public relations nightmare for the Egyptian president, who has cracked down on Islamists since toppling president Mohammed Morsi in July 2013.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who pressed for Greste's release, spoke with Mr Sisi to thank him for his role in freeing the journalist.
Greste is scheduled to hold a press conference in Brisbane at 10:00am (AEST).
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