Syria has freed more than 400 civil servants, judges, lawyers and journalists detained this year in a crackdown on social media dissent, a move seen by rights activists and former detainees as intended to win over public opinion ahead of presidential elections.
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Those released after being held under Syria's cybercrimes law were among thousands freed this month under a general amnesty for currency speculators, drug dealers, smugglers and kidnappers ahead of the May 26 election that is expected to hand President Bashar Assad a fourth term.
Most of the freed social media critics were supporters of Syrian authorities' handling of the uprising in 2011 that spiraled into a war that has killed hundreds of thousands.
The amnesty excluded tens of thousands of Assad opponents and political detainees held for years without trial, many of whom are believed dead, rights groups say.
