DEARBORN, Michigan: A prominent Arab-American businessman who says he spent two years as an "economic hostage" in Qatar has left the Persian Gulf nation and says he expects to return this week to his family in the United States.

Forty-seven-year-old Nasser Beydoun joined a Qatari investment group in 2007 to open restaurants in the Middle East. The U.S. citizen said in March that he'd been unable to leave for about two years because of a dispute with his former boss, despite prevailing in court proceedings.

Beydoun told the Detroit Free Press newspaper by phone from Lebanon on Monday that "it feels great" to be free.

He had sought help from members of the state of Michigan's congressional delegation, who wrote to U.S. and Qatari officials on his behalf.