A court in Turkey has acquitted the country's former Islamist Prime Minister, Necmettin Erbakan, of insulting the Constitutional Court.

Mr Erbakan was alleged to have slandered the Court in January after it outlawed his pro-Islamic Welfare Party and barred him from politics for five years.

The Ankara Criminal Court ruled today that Mr Erbakan's remarks were not sufficiently widely heard to be a public crime.

Mr Erbakan, who was forced to resign as Prime Minister in June last year, after prolonged wrangling with the military over his religious reforms could still be prosecuted for embezzlement and inciting hatred.