(CNN) Italy has been ordered to pay compensation to Amanda Knox, an American former student who spent years under the cloud of a murder she didn't commit.

Europe's top human rights court ruled Thursday that Knox's rights were violated in the hours after she was arrested in the Italian city of Perugia over the killing of her British housemate, Meredith Kercher , in 2007.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) said Italy should pay Knox 18,400 euros (about $20,800) for failing to provide her with a lawyer and an appropriate interpreter when she was first detained. But it found there was no evidence for her claim that she was mistreated while in police custody.

Knox's case and subsequent appeals attracted global attention for years, as it see-sawed through the Italian legal system. Knox was finally cleared of murder in 2015, but she has been fighting a three-year sentence for blaming someone for the murder who was later found to have an alibi.

As part of her challenge to that conviction, for making a "malicious accusation" during police questioning, Knox was granted permission to take the case to the ECHR.

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