Turkish judges throw out amnesty law

Mehmet Ali Agca is Turkey's most famous inmate

Turkey's Constitutional Court has cancelled an amnesty under which thousands of prisoners were expected to be released - including the Pope's would-be assassin, Mehmet Ali Agca.

The court unanimously decided to revoke Article 1 of the amnesty law, which shortens jail terms by 10 years for a number of crimes.

5,000 inmates could be set free

However the annulment will not take effect until the decision has been published officially.

Correspondents say it is unclear how the court's decision will affect the enforcement of the amnesty law, under which a number of people have already been released.

It can take from a few days to a few months for court decisions to be published.

The amnesty law was referred to the court by President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, who challenged its passage by parliament as unconstitutional.

The court rejected the president's request to suspend the law entirely, which would have stopped prisoners being released in the meantime.

Papal pardon

The amnesty law, which broadens the scope of a 1999 amnesty, is expected to result in the release of up to 5,000 prisoners.

The law proved controversial, when it emerged that Mehmet Ali Agca - a far-right militant who spent 19 years in jail in Italy for shooting the pope in 1981 and who is now serving a long sentence in Turkey - could have his prison term reduced and be eventually set free.

The pope narrowly escaped death in 1981

Italy extradited Agca to Turkey in June 2000, after the Pope publicly pardoned him for the attempt on his life.

The pope even visited Agca in prison.

After Agca returned to Turkey, he was put in jail to serve a 10-year sentence for the 1979 murder of a prominent Turkish journalist and a second jail term of seven years for armed robbery.

Among those already freed under the new amnesty law is ultranationalist militant Isa Armagan.

He was jailed for a 1978 armed attack on three coffee houses in Ankara, which killed five people dead and injured 14 others.