Nigerian mother wins appeal against stoning death

A Nigerian court yesterday spared a woman from being stoned to death by overturning an Islamic court's conviction for adultery, easing pressure on the government of President Olusegun Obasanjo.

Western governments led by the European Union had urged Obasanjo to intervene in the case involving Amina Lawal who was convicted in March 2002 after having a baby outside wedlock.

The sharia judgment had divided Muslim opinion and deepened a deadly sectarian rift in the country of over 120 million, split almost evenly between Muslims and Christians.

"It is the view of this court that the judgment of the Upper Sharia Court, Funtua, was very wrong and the appeal of Amina Lawal is hereby discharged and acquitted," judge Ibrahim Maiangwa said in the Muslim court in the northern Nigerian town of Katsina.

He said the original conviction of the lower court "is not consonant with the laws of Katsina state because the police did not arrest the suspects when they committed the offence".

Lawal, holding her baby, smiled as the ruling was read out to the courtroom packed with journalists, and human rights lawyers and activists who had spearheaded the appeal of the 31-year-old illiterate woman.