By Caroline Wyatt BBC Paris correspondent

A court in Paris has cleared three press photographers of breaching France's strict privacy rules by taking pictures of Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed on the night they died.

The crash site remains a shrine to Diana

The photographers - Jacques Langevin of the Sygma Corbis agency, Christian Martinez of the Angelis agency and freelancer Eric Chassery - were among eight paparazzi who followed the couple the night they died in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

The verdict itself was something of an anti-climax.

Courtroom 17 was almost empty, apart from judge, the prosecutor and the men's lawyers.

Just six journalists sat on the press benches, and in the end the verdict in the first and last court case relating to the death of Princess and Diana and Dodi Al Fayed took less than 30 seconds to read out.

Inside view

The three accused were not in court as the judge read out their names and said one word "acquitted".

The case itself centred on photographs taken on the night the couple died, 31 August 1997.

The trial was the first and last Diana case in France

A security camera showed them leaving the Paris Ritz with their driver and bodyguard.

It was after this that the paparazzi took photos of the couple inside their Mercedes - before giving chase.

Not long afterwards, the car lay a shattered wreck in an underpass.

Yet even here, the paparazzi were taking photos of the couple - until they realised Diana and Al Fayed had not survived.

No secret

An earlier French investigation into charging all eight paparazzi for endangering the couple by chasing their car and failing to assist after an accident came to nothing.

Now we can work normally again Jacques Langevin Photographer

So Dodi's father, Mohamed Al Fayed, the Egyptian-born owner of London's Harrods department store, launched a civil case instead, leading to the charge against three of the eight photographers.

They were accused of invasion of privacy for taking pictures of the couple inside their car, which under French privacy laws could be considered a private space.

In a written summary of the judgement, the judge said that even though the photos were taken inside the car, they had not shown any intimate gesture or behaviour between Diana and Dodi, and nor had they revealed any secret liaison as the relationship was already well known.

Added to that, the photographers had not sought to hide the fact they were taking photos.

Diana and Al Fayed, the judge said, would have been aware that photographers might take their picture as they left the hotel.

Inquest

The verdict was welcomed by the photographers, who have termed it a victory for the freedom of the press.

Jacques Langevin, a well-known war photographer, looked relieved as he arrived at court shortly after the verdict to give his reaction to the media.

"This was a very particular case," he said. "Now we can work normally again."

Even today, the Paris underpass where Diana and Dodi Al Fayed met their deaths remains a place of pilgrimage, with scrawled messages from visitors around the world.

Mohamed Al Fayed has warned that he will appeal against the verdict, but lawyers in Paris say they see no legal reason to overturn the judgement.

If his appeal fails, all legal action in France will have finished - clearing the way for a British inquest next year into the couple's death.