The boundaries of free speech in Europe widened Thursday after a Dutch court acquitted politician Geert Wilders of inciting hatred against Muslims when he compared Islam with Naziism and called for a ban on the Quran.

Political analysts say the ruling will likely embolden Wilders and other right-wing populists across the continent to ramp up their anti-immigrant rhetoric, with remarks like Wilders' call for a "head rag tax" now squarely within the boundaries of fair political debate.

The ruling did lay down a clear limit: Calls for violence remain out of bounds. Wilders, who has lived under constant police protection due to death threats since 2004, has never called for violence or endorsed it.

Presiding Judge Marcel van Oosten said some of Wilders' comments — such as saying foreign influences are "breeding" in the Netherlands and threatening to overrun Dutch culture — may be "crude and denigrating." But he said they did not amount to inciting hatred and must be seen in a wider context of a fierce national debate over immigration policy and multiculturalism.

While the United States has enshrined the right to freedom of speech in its Constitution, many European nations introduced hate-speech laws in the wake of World War II, determined to prevent the scapegoating of minorities.

A Spanish court has upheld a ban by a city on face-covering Islamic veils worn in municipal buildings.

In 2010, the city of Lleida became the first Spanish one to impose such a ban. But the Catalan regional Superior Justice Tribunal suspended it following an appeal by a Muslim association that claimed it violated basic rights.

The court ruled Wednesday that the northeastern city was within its rights to ban the clothing in municipal buildings for security and identification purposes. It also backed Lleida's argument that the veils are discriminatory.

Other Spanish towns have taken similar steps but their burqa bans have yet to take effect.

Lleida's one is largely symbolic since only about 3 percent of Lleida's population is Muslim and very few wear face-covering garments.

A 25-year-old Malaysian transsexual wants a court to affirm she is a woman following sex-change surgery so she can change her name and gender on her identification documents, her lawyer said Thursday.

Sex-change surgery is legal in mainly Muslim Malaysia, but transsexuals often cannot legally change their gender status.

Lawyer Horley Isaacs said Ashraf Hafiz Abdul Aziz underwent a complete sex-change operation in Thailand in 2008 but that the National Registration Department refused to update her gender and name on her identity card.

"Since young, she has felt like a woman trapped in a man's body," Isaacs told The Associated Press. "Doctors who evaluated her after her operation found her to be a woman in her physical and psychological buildup. We want the court to declare she is a woman and that she be given a change of name and gender."

Ashraf, the third of five children, has the support of her parents to change her name to Aleesha Farhana Abdul Aziz, Isaacs said, adding that the High Court will rule on her case July 18.

Activists have estimated there are at least 50,000 transsexuals in Malaysia, many of whom face widespread prejudice and often cannot find employment.

Britain's former deputy prime minister won the right Monday to a legal review of the way London's Metropolitan Police handled the wide-ranging phone hacking campaign mounted by a British tabloid newspaper.

John Prescott — who was the deputy of former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair — claimed police breached his human rights by not informing him that people working for the scandal-hungry News of The World may have listened to his voice mails.

High Court judge David Foskett granted Prescott and three other people — lawmaker Chris Bryant, journalist Brendan Montague and former senior police officer Brian Paddick — the right to seek a judicial review of the way the Metropolitan Police dealt with their cases.

Their lawyer, Hugh Tomlinson, said the men believed police became aware of the phone hacking in 2006, but failed to inform them they were victims, did not respond adequately to their requests for information and failed to carry out an effective investigation at the time.

James Lewis, the lawyer acting for the Metropolitan Police, argued that a judicial review is not necessary because police are now carrying out their own investigation into the phone hacking scandal.

A London court sentenced a former government minister to 16 months in prison on Friday over the largest bogus claim exposed in Britain's lawmaker expenses scandal.

Elliot Morley pleaded guilty last month to two charges of false accounting over bills worth 32,000 pounds (nearly $52,000).

The 58-year-old former Labour Party politician claimed for mortgage payments on a loan that had already been paid off.

Justice John Saunders told Southwark Crown Court that Morley was guilty of "blatant dishonesty" and had "thrown away his good name and character."

In his verdict, Saunders said he was satisfied that "the excessive claims were made deliberately and are not explicable even in part by oversight."

The sentencing follows the 2009 disclosure of previously secret expense files that revealed how politicians had billed the public for items including swank second homes and pornographic movies.

Morley is the first former minister to be jailed for fiddling his expenses; three other former lawmakers received terms ranging from 12 to 18 months.

The case ended a political career spanning nearly 20 years. Morley, an environment minister in Tony Blair's government, chose not to run again for Parliament last year.