An appeals court has suspended the three-month jail terms given to two Britons convicted of having sex on a beach in Dubai.
Michelle Palmer, 37, and Vince Acors, 34, will now be deported from the country, their lawyer Hassan Matar said.
"The three-month prison term has been suspended," an appeal court judge said, reading the verdict on Tuesday.
The two were convicted in October of having sex in a public place and drinking alcohol in a highly publicised case in the Gulf emirate, which despite its pro-Western outlook still adheres to certain strict Islamic rules and bans sex out of wedlock.
Palmer and Acors denied the charges of having sex in public and committing public indecency, but admitted to being under the influence of alcohol when they were caught on Dubai's Jumeirah public beach in July.
The case turned the spotlight on the lifestyle of the 120,000-plus British residents of the UAE, about 100,000 of whom live in Dubai, a bustling city state which hosts hundreds of thousands of Western residents and tourists.
