A British man who spent 18 years in a Pakistan jail for a murder he says he didn't commit, has been released, the Pakistan interior minister said.
President Pervez Musharraf commuted Mirza Tahir Hussain's death sentence on Wednesday after the British government and rights groups had pleaded for clemency for him.
Hussain (36), a British Muslim of Pakistani descent from Leeds, was convicted of killing a taxi driver in Islamabad in 1988.
He said the man had tried to sexually assault him and then threatened him with a gun, which went off when they struggled.
He was originally acquitted by Pakistan's High Court, but an Islamic court sentenced him to death in 1998. The sentence was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2003, and a review petition was rejected a year later.
But the government had put off his execution several times, most recently until the end of the year, and officials said they were trying to find a way to spare him.