A Libyan journalist detained for four months in prison charged with insulting the judiciary was released Sunday on bail, his lawyer told Agence France Presse.

"Amara Abdullah al-Khitabi was released at the end of a hearing on Sunday upon the payment of 500 dinars ($390) and confiscation of his passport, and is now with his people," said Ramadan Salem.

Global hopes that democracy could replace dictatorships in Arab Spring nations risk being crushed by repressive regimes, the United States warned Friday in its annual human rights report.

"The hope of the early days of the Arab Awakening has run up against the harsh realities of incomplete and contested transitions," the State Department said in its assessment of the global situation of human rights in 2012.

French prosecutors on Friday opened a probe into allegations the Libyan regime contributed to the 2007 campaign of Nicolas Sarkozy, who went on to become president, a judicial source said.

The probe -- the latest in a string of allegations relating to Sarkozy's years in office and electoral campaigns -- is looking into charges of "active and passive corruption", "influence peddling" and others, the source added.

A top aide to Libyan Prime Minister Ali Zeidan kidnapped at the end of last month in a Tripoli suburb has been released, a source close to the cabinet said on Tuesday.

"Mohammed Ali al-Gattus, an adviser and head of the premier's office, was freed on Monday and is now with his close ones and in good health," the source told Agence France Presse, asking for anonymity.

Libya and Egypt are to appeal against an Egyptian court ruling blocking the extradition of Moammar Gadhafi's cousin Ahmed Qaddaf al-Dam to face corruption charges, Prime Minster Ali Zeidan said Monday.

"The governments of Libya and Egypt have decided to appeal the Egyptian administrative court's order against the extradition," Zeidan told a press briefing in Tripoli.

Gunmen posing as security personnel kidnapped a top aide of Libyan Prime Minister Ali Zeidan, just hours after the premier revealed members of his government had received death threats, a cabinet source told Agence France Presse on Monday.

"The adviser and head of the prime minister's office was kidnapped on Sunday evening as he was driving to Tripoli" from Libya's third city Misrata, the source told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Two British activists with a humanitarian convoy destined for the Gaza Strip were subjected to a brutal gang rape by five men in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi, the deputy prime minister said Thursday.

The two women of Pakistani origin "were brutally raped in front of their father," Awadh al-Barassi said on his Facebook page, condemning "a horrible act."

Egyptian authorities on Tuesday proceeded with the extradition to Libya of two former regime officials wanted on charges of corruption, a judicial source told Agence France Presse.

Former Libyan ambassador Ali Maria and and Mohammed Ibrahim, the brother of senior Gadhafi-era official Ahmed Ibrahim, were arrested in Cairo on March 19 along with Moammar Gadhafi's cousin Ahmed Qaddaf al-Dam.

Family members of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi who had taken refuge in Algeria during the revolution that toppled the long-time dictator have now moved to Oman, Libya's foreign minister said on Monday.

"Some of the family has moved to Oman," Mohammed Abdelaziz told reporters in Doha following reports that Gadhafi's relatives who fled to Algeria in August 2011 had now left that country.

The Egyptian state prosecutor decided on Sunday to extradite to Libya two former regime officials wanted on charges of corruption, a judicial source told Agence France Presse.

Former Libyan ambassador Ali Maria and and Mohammed Ibrahim, the brother of senior Gadhafi-era official Ahmed Ibrahim, were arrested in Cairo on March 19 along with Moammar Gadhafi's cousin Ahmed Qaddaf al-Dam.