Nairobi/Khartoum  - A woman who has become a women's rights icon in Sudan on Monday escaped being lashed for wearing trousers, but was jailed for a month after refusing to pay a 200-dollar fine, reports said.

Lubna Ahmed Hussein, a columnist and former public information officer at the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS), was arrested in Khartoum along with 13 other women in early July.

Ten of the other women arrested with Hussein were given 10 lashes after admitting to breaching Islamic law. But Hussein demanded a lawyer in a move she said was designed to draw attention to women's rights in Sudan.

Hussein faced 40 lashes for wearing "indecent" clothing.

Her lawyers told the BBC that she had refused to pay the fine as she did not want "to give the decision any legitimacy" and had been taken to Omdurman women's prison.

Attempts to reach Hussein for comment failed as her mobile phone was turned off shortly after her trial.

Hussein resigned from her UN position in order to face trial in early August. However, the trial was delayed until today amid questions of whether her status as a former UN employee still afforded her immunity from prosecution.

The move was widely interpreted as a way for Sudan to save face and avoid international condemnation.

Human rights body Amnesty International on Friday called for Sudan to drop the charges against Hussein and change the law to prevent further floggings for indecent dress.

Sharia - Islamic law - applies in the north of Sudan, although the mainly Christian and animist Southern Sudan is exempt under a 2005 peace deal that ended a decades-long long civil war between north and south.

Some Christian women from the south were among those flogged.

Hussein argued there is no specific law banning the wearing of trousers in sharia, although the wearing of indecent clothing is illegal in Sudan. dpa