Freed Sudanese 'apostate' re-arrested

A Sudanese woman sentenced to death for “apostasy” has been rearrested by the Sudanese authorities, shortly after being released from jail.

Meriam Ibrahim was to have been executed for marrying a Christian man, Daniel Wani, but was released on Sunday after an appeals court in the country ruled that a lower court’s judgement against her had been faulty.

However, the couple have now been re-arrested in an airport in Khartoum, shortly before they attempted to leave the country, according to a source familiar with the couple.

"The National Security took her and Daniel," said the source, referring to Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag, 26, and her American husband Daniel Wani.

The status of their two young children, one a newborn baby, was not immediately known.

Details for this new arrest have not been released.

Released on Sunday

Official media confirmed that an appeals court annulled the earlier verdict against Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag, 26.

Her case sparked an outcry from Western governments and rights groups after a judge sentenced her to death on 15 May.

Almost one million people appealed to save her life on the Change.org petition website.

Ishag's husband Wani is a US citizen.

Ishag was born in eastern Sudan's Gedaref state on 3 November, 1987, but her Sudanese Muslim father abandoned the family when Ishag was five, leaving her to be raised according to her mother's faith, an earlier statement from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khartoum said.

"She has never been a Muslim in her life," said the statement which added she joined the Catholic church shortly before she married her Khartoum-born husband in December 2011.

The case against Ishag originated with "a group of men who claim to be Meriam's relatives" but who, in fact, she had never seen before, the archdiocese said.

The Ishag controversy was the latest problem facing Sudan, an impoverished nation battling rebellions in its west and south, while more than six million people need humanitarian aid.