Jordanian writer Nahed Hattar killed outside court before trial

A prominent Jordanian writer has been shot dead outside a court where he was due to stand trial.

Nahed Hattar, 56, was about to attend a hearing after being charged with contempt of religion for sharing a caricature seen as insulting to Islam.

He was arrested last month for posting on social media the cartoon that depicted a bearded man in heaven smoking in bed with women and asking God to bring him wine and cashews.

Many conservative Muslim Jordanians considered this offensive and against their religion. Authorities said he violated the law by sharing the picture.

A gunman was arrested at the scene, the country's state news agency, Petra, said.

The agency quoted a security source as saying Hattar was killed by a man who fired three shots at him on the steps of the palace of justice in the Jordanian capital, Amman.

"The assailant was arrested and investigations are ongoing," Petra quoted the source as saying.

Two witnesses said the gunman, who was bearded and in his 50s, was wearing a traditional Arab dishdasha.

The garment is worn by ultra-conservative Sunni Salafis, who follow a puritanical version of Islam and shun Western lifestyles.

Hattar, a secular Christian and anti-Islamist activist, had apologised for sharing the cartoon and said he had not intended to insult God.

He said he had shared it to mock fundamentalist Sunni radicals and what he said was their vision of God and heaven.

Hattar also accused his Islamist opponents of using the caricature to settle scores with him.