Gibbons Returns to Merseyside From Sudan Jail

Gillian Gibbons, the "ordinary primary school teacher" who went from Liverpool to Sudan, had a misadventure with a teddy bear and ended up in a Khartoum jail, was back on Merseyside last night.

As dusk fell, she had taken refuge in Aigburth, south Liverpool, at the home of a friend who lived near the semi-detached home Gibbons shared with her husband, Peter, before they divorced.

Gibbons had been pardoned and freed by Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, on Monday and arrived at Heath row yesterday. She gave few clues about her future at a careful press conference at the airport. "I'm looking for a job - I am jobless," she said, frequently smiling as she sat between her son and daughter. "So my immediate plan is to spend Christmas with my family, and then seriously look for employment."

Would that be abroad? "I'll have to discuss that with my family."

Gibbons had been jailed for 15 days for allowing her six- and seven-year-old pupils at a Khartoum school name a toy bear Muhammed and was held for a week until released following delicate negotiations by Lord Ahmed and Lady Warsi.

At Heath row, Gibbons said: "I'm just an ordinary middle-aged primary school teacher, I went out there to have a bit of an adventure, and got a bit more adventure than I bargained for."

She said: "I was well-treated in prison ... I was very sorry to leave Sudan.

"The Sudanese people I found to be extremely kind and extremely generous."

Back in Waver tree, Abdul Hamid, a doctor at the Royal Liverpool hospital, arrived at John Gibbons' home with flowers and a card that read: "Welcome back home, Gillian! From Islamic Society of Britain and Abdullah Quilliam Society."