New Delhi, July 10 -- Lebanese authorities on Wednesday released on bail a pop star-turned-militant who had spent months in jail awaiting a retrial on charges of belonging to an armed group and money laundering, judicial officials said.

Fadel Shaker had surrendered after 12 years on the run last October, giving himself up to the Lebanese military intelligence service after hiding in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh near the port city of Sidon.

Shaker had been tried in absentia in 2020, sentenced to 22 years in prison for supporting a "terrorist group" over bloody street clashes that had erupted in 2013 between Sunni militants and Lebanese army soldiers near Sidon.

According to four judicial officials, he paid 500 million L...