A lower court in the Sicilian city of Palermo on Friday sentenced Libyan researcher Kadhiga Shabbi to a year and eight months in prison for inciting acts of terrorism.
Shabbi was tried in a fast-track trial and the court suspended her sentence, releasing her from custody.
Shabbi's lawyer Michele Andreano said she would appeal her sentence.
"My client has not commented on today's verdict but when she heard she would released from prison she cried with joy," local daily Il Giornale di Sicilia cited Andreano as saying.
Prosecutors had asked for a jail term of four and a half years for Shabbi, who was allegedly in contact with numerous foreign jihadists and had spread propaganda for Al-Qaeda via Facebook and other social media.
She allegedly sent sums of money to Turkey and tried to bring a jihadist cousin to Italy from Libya who was killed in a gun battle in the chaos-wracked North African country.
Shabbi is related to a member of a jihadist group involved in the 2012 attack on the US diplomatic compound in the Libyan city of Benghazi in which US ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans died.
The academic denies all the charges against her. She was arrested in Palermo in December 2015 and had arrived in Italy three years ago to complete a doctorate in economics at the University of Palermo.
.jpg)
.jpg)
