Formula One: FIA president Max Mosley tonight declared himself "absolutely at ease" with the decision not to punish Renault over their role in the spy saga.
Renault were today found guilty by the World Motor Sport Council of being in unauthorised possession of confidential technical information belonging to McLaren.
But the WMSC opted not to impose any penalty against the French marque, allowing them to compete in next year's Formula One world championship without any cloud hanging over them.
Speaking after the five-hour hearing in Monaco, Mosley said: "We will put out a full explanation of the decision tomorrow and that will explain everything.
"I wouldn't say it was a fairly easy decision to take because the hearing took several hours. No decision is easy, it's always complicated. But I am absolutely at ease with this decision."
When it was put to Mosley that the general public would find the decision hard to digest, he replied: "When they see the reasons they'll understand."
The verdict is a remarkable mirror-image of the decision initially taken against McLaren in July when they were found guilty of being in unauthorised possession of technical information belonging to Ferrari.
However, due to lack of evidence, McLaren avoided punishment, but were warned by the FIA that if the information stolen from Ferrari was found to be used in the future, they could face exclusion from the championship.
The verdict caused uproar, with Mosley forced into announcing an appeal hearing.
When fresh evidence did surface, McLaren were hauled back in front of the WMSC in September and ultimately found guilty, which led to a sporting record £50million fine, while the team were stripped of all constructors' points for 2007.
It was a punishment that did not sit well with Mosley as he felt the drivers - Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso - should have been excluded from the championship.
In this instance, no such qualms exist, and when asked to explain how Renault could be found guilty, but not punished, he replied: "That happens an awful lot.
"There is something in England, for example, called an absolute discharge."
Understandably, Renault boss Flavio Briatore was delighted as he said: "I would like to thank Renault, our title sponsor ING and all our partners for their wholehearted support during this sensitive period.
"I also wish to pay tribute to the team, which has handled the matter with integrity and dignity. We are pleased that we can now focus fully on our preparations for the 2008 championship."
However, his comments fly in the face of his outraged stance in the wake of the July decision against McLaren.
On that occasion, Briatore said: "I don't understand what happened.
"If the FIA admits to have established possession of Ferrari material by McLaren, then why is there no retribution? This verdict reminds me of Pontius Pilate."
McLaren may also consider the verdict an injustice, particularly in light of the penalty they eventually received.
McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh said: "We made the case to the World Motor Sport Council that we felt it was not appropriate to impose the sort of penalty on any team that we suffered.
"We made it very clear we weren't pushing for that, even though we believed it to be a serious case.
"But we haven't had all of the thinking behind their ruling, so it is inappropriate to say anything else at the moment."
As far the FIA are concerned, this case is now closed as the information at the team's disposal would only have had a direct bearing on last season's car.
The case surrounded engineer Phil Mackereth, who joined Renault from McLaren in September 2006 and took with him information proprietary to McLaren and contained on 11 floppy disks.
The information related to details of the McLaren fuelling system, gear assembly, oil cooling system, hydraulic control system and a novel suspension component used by the 2006 and 2007 McLaren cars.
The information was viewed by nine members of Renault's staff, and when printed out, amounted to 762 pages, but with only 18 individual technical drawings.
Following an internal investigation, Renault subsequently suspended Mackereth and returned the floppy disks to McLaren.
With Renault in the clear, Briatore is now likely to pursue his ambition of re-signing Alonso.
The Spaniard won the drivers' championships in 2005 and 2006 with the French marque, while helping them win the constructors' titles in the same years.