The accused leader of an al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group was sentenced to 30 months in jail by an Indonesian court today for conspiracy charges related to the 2002 Bali nightclub bombing.
The bomb killed 202 people and injured hundreds more.
Abu Bakar Bashir
Abu Bakar Bashir was cleared of more serious charges that he ordered the bombing, which was aimed at foreign tourists and also killed 88 Australians.
He was also cleared of charges related to the 2003 bombing of the Marriott hotel in Jakarta that killed 12 and charges he incited his followers to launch terrorist attacks.
"Neither the defence witnesses nor the prosecutors' witnesses said that the defendant has planned or provoked other people to commit the bombings," the court said in its verdict.
"The perpetrators of the Marriott bombings admitted they did that on their own will," it said. "Therefore the defendant has to be acquitted from primary charges."
Australia and the United States consider Bashir to be the spiritual head of the Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist group. Intelligence officials say the group has cells across Southeast Asia.
The five-judge panel said that Bashir, who has been in jail since April, would get credit for time served and could be freed before the end of 2006.
In a sign of the weakness of their case, prosecutors had been demanding only an eight-year sentence. Bashir (66), could have faced a maximum penalty of death according to Indonesian law.
The judges also said there was no evidence nor witnesses that proved Bashir took part in an "evil conspiracy" to bomb the hotel. Bashir was in jail at the time of the attack.
Most analysts had predicted that Bashir would either walk free or receive a prison term far short of the maximum allowed, partly due to the prosecution's weak case.
AP