A Canadian appellate court released  former Guantanamo detainee Omar Khadr on bail Thursday, rejecting the government's attempt to keep him in prison while he fights a US conviction for murdering an American soldier.

"You are free to go," Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Myra Bielby was quoted by Canadian media as saying to Khadr, who has spent the last 13 years behind bars, most of it at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.