Roman Polanski will not be extradited to the US. The film director - who has been under house arrest for the past nine months in Switzerland - is wanted in America for sentencing on a 33-year-old statutory rape conviction, relating to an incident in which he had sex with a 13-year-old girl.
However, Swiss officials have now chosen not to hand him over to the US authorities.
The Swiss Justice Ministry said in a statement: "The 76-year-old French-Polish film director Roman Polanski will not be extradited to the US. The freedom-restricting measures against him have been revoked."
Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, head of the Swiss Federal Department of Justice and Police (FDJP), said: "The freedom-restricting measures against him (Polanski) have been revoked."
In 1977, The 'Pianist' director pleaded guilty to charges of having underage sex with 13-year-old Samantha Gailey, now known as Samantha Geimer.
He believed he would face a jail term of just 42 days, and claimed a judge had reneged on a plea bargain deal to reduce the charges from rape and serious sexual assault if he admitted under-age sex.
On the day of his sentencing he fled to London, then Paris, as France does not have an extradition treaty to the US.
The 76-year-old film director was placed under house arrest in December, after being taken into custody in September while attending a film festival in Zurich.
