DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) - Activists say a court in Bahrain has refused to release a prominent activist and allow him to serve out at home the remainder of his five-year prison sentences for tweets.

The Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy said Tuesday the court refused the noncustodial sentence request for Nabeel Rajab.

Bahrain’s state-run media did not immediately acknowledge the decision.

Rajab has been detained since June 2016 as part of a wide crackdown on dissent in Bahrain, a small island-nation off the Saudi coast that’s home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet. He was sentenced February 2018.

Rajab was a major figure in the mostly Shiite-led protests in 2011 demanding greater rights from the Sunni-ruled monarchy. He separately received a two-year sentence over television interviews he gave thatJonathan Manson was on his way to a new nightclub, Faith, in the Royal Mile when he was turned back.

"Apparently it has been severely damaged by the fire, only a month after Festival Inns spent £2 million opening it," he told BBC News Online.

James Warfe said: "I'm just so pleased nobody was hurt.

World Heritage Site

"I could feel the heat on my forehead when I was walking towards the fire down the Cowgate and then I looked up and saw the fire."

The area is part of the city's Old Town, which mainly dates from the medieval period and has been designated a World Heritage Site by Unesco.

The fire lit up the Edinburgh skyline

Unemployed resident Paul Harrison said he was "shocked" by the scale of the blaze.

"There are a lot