Ernst Zundel sits in a court in Mannheim, Germany, Nov. 8, 2005.

BERLIN - Ernst Zundel, the far-right activist deported from Canada in 2005, will soon be released from prison after serving his five-year sentence for denying the Holocaust, a German prosecutor said Wednesday.

Mannheim prosecutor Andreas Grossmann said Zundel, 70, will be released March 1 after receiving credit for time served ahead of his 2007 trial.

He was convicted in February 2007 of 14 counts of inciting hatred for years of anti-Semitic activities, including contributing to a website devoted to denying the Holocaust - a crime in Germany.

Prosecutors were able to bring charges in Germany because the website was accessible there. Zundel, who also has lived in Tennessee, and his supporters had argued he was exercising his right to free speech.

Zundel is a German citizen so he can go wherever he wants in the country following his release, Grossmann said, adding that he has relatives in the Stuttgart area.

Zundel, author of "The Hitler We Loved and Why," was deported from Canada in 2005 after a lengthy fight.

Grossmann said he understood that Zundel is banned by the United States and Canada from returning to those countries.

Zundel's wife, Ingrid Zundel, told The Associated Press in an email that he was not technically barred from North America but that they "expect huge diplomatic barriers to keep him inside Germany where freedom of speech simply doesn't exist."

Lawyer Peter Lindsay, who represented Zundel at the hearings in Canada, said Zundel is technically barred from the country.

"He was subject to a security certificate in Canada and he was deported after being found to be a danger to national security in 2005, so he can't come back to Canada," he said.

Ingrid Zundel said she has been in regular contact with her husband and that he fears for his life upon his release, because he is "ferociously hated" by many for his writings about the Holocaust.

"We fear that, at the very least, he will be re-arrested on flimsiest pretence and put back into prison for life," she said.

However, she told The Canadian Press in an email that her husband intends to obey German laws after his release, because he has said all there is to say.

"What else could he possibly add?" Ingrid Zundel wrote.

"As long as he lives in Germany, even if he is free, he will obey the laws of Germany. That does not mean he agrees with them."

"My guess is he would like to live a normal life and get back to what he likes best - doing his beautiful paintings."

Born in Germany in 1939, Zundel emigrated to Canada in 1958 and lived in Toronto and Montreal until 2001. Canadian officials twice rejected his attempts to obtain Canadian citizenship, and he moved to Pigeon Forge, Tenn., until being deported to Canada in 2003 for alleged immigration violations.

In February 2005, Federal Court of Canada Justice Pierre Blais ruled that Zundel's activities were not only a threat to national security, but "the international community of nations" as well, clearing the way for his deportation to Germany.

Blais found Zundel to be a hate-monger who posed a threat to national security because of his close association with white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups that had resorted to violence to press their political and social causes.

Zundel's lawyer at the time said he was treated unfairly by the Canadian legal system but that no one was interested in protecting the rights of unpopular people.

Zundel spent the last two years of his time in Canada in solitary confinement in a Toronto jail under anti-terrorism legislation. Despite his long stay in Canada, he was not able to convert his landed immigrant status into citizenship.

Since his arrest, Ingrid Zundel - who has remained in the United States - said she has been running his website, so she cannot risk being present when her husband is released.