The ex-president, commonly known as Lula, was sentenced to eight years and ten months and thirteen years in prison respectively in two different cases involving corruption. The president, who is popular in broad population layers, himself denies all accusations and claims that they aimed to prevent him from running in last year's presidential election where he was favored.

The decision on his release was made by a judge, hours after Brazil's highest court paved the way for the release of thousands of convicts.

HD's judges voted six to five with the numbers to scrap a three-year-old decision that sentenced people who lost their first appeal are forced to sit in custody. Instead, according to the court's new decision, they should be free until they have exhausted their opportunities to appeal.

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This means that thousands of imprisoned people, including a number of politicians and business leaders who have been convicted in a major corruption investigation, may be released.

If he was released, the judges mean he is still barred from resuming his political career - unless HD concludes that current Justice Minister Sergio Moro, who during his time as judge in 2017 was a member of Lula, was biased.

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Such suspicions have been aroused against Moro after a leak of chat messages that could be interpreted as he worked directly with investigators to get Lula convicted and stopped from running for president. Fun denies being biased.

HD's decision on Thursday is being questioned by the special investigators who lead the large corruption investigation Operação lava jato (Operation car wash), which in recent years has led to bribery and corruption judgments against politicians of all estimations as well as a number of prominent business leaders. The court's decision risks making work against corruption more difficult, the investigators believe.