An irregular immigrant on the run spent the past months living at Mosta church after returning to Malta to regularise his position, a court heard yesterday.

Gergis Nadi Saad Fadil, 31, from Egypt, had escaped from the Safi Detention Centre fearing the Maltese authorities would send him back home where he would be persecuted because he was a Coptic Christian, Police Inspector Edel Mary Camilleri said.

She told Magistrate Carol Peralta the Commissioner for Refugees informed her some days ago that Mr Fadil had returned to Malta. Investigations revealed that he had been living with priests.

Defence lawyer Gianluca Caruana Curran asked for clemency.

The prosecution argued that while the accused deserved a prison term, a suspended sentence would suffice because, by law, he would still be kept in detention.

Magistrate Peralta handed down a one-year jail term suspended for two years.