A Nigerian court has spared a woman from being stoned to death by overturning an Islamic court's conviction for adultery.
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Ms Amina Lawal and her child.
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Western governments led by the European Union had urged Nigerian authorities to intervene since Ms Amina Lawal, an illiterate 31-year-old who was convicted of adultery in March 2002 for having a baby 10 months after a divorce.
Campaign groups outraged by the Islamic sentence had vowed to mount protests if the Sharia Appeals Court in the conservative state of Katsina upheld the judgment.
The introduction of sharia criminal law by a dozen states in predominantly Islamic northern Nigeria has deepened ethnic and religious rifts in the multi-ethnic country of over 120 million. Ms Lawal's case has also divided Muslim opinion.