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A woman jailed for complaining about the volume of her neighbourhood mosque's loudspeaker has lost her final appeal.

The mum-of-four, Meliana, was found guilty of blasphemy when she went on trial in Indonesia last year, and was sentenced to 18 months.

The 44-year-old woman launched two appeals, but judges on the south-east Asian country's Supreme Court have agreed with a lower court's decision and upheld the sentence.

It means Meliana has run out of legal options - and will now have to serve out her 18-month sentence in a case that has been condemned by human rights groups and highlighted the country's blasphemy laws.

Human Rights Watch said the rejected appeal is "another nail in the coffin of religious freedom and tolerance in Indonesia".

Indonesia has the world’s largest population of Muslims, and sizable Buddhist, Christian and other religious minorities, but the propagation of conservative and hardline interpretations of Islam in recent years has fanned fears that the secular nation is becoming less tolerant.

Meliana, a Chinese, Buddhist resident of Medan on Sumatra island, had complained to neighbours about the volume of the loudspeaker at the mosque across the street from her home in the summer of 2016.

Her complaints allegedly triggered riots in Tanjung Balai, where rioters attacked and torched several Buddhist temples, the news website Coconuts reported.

(Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Meliana’s lawyers said she had made remarks in a private conversation on the volume of mosque loudspeakers.

Those remarks were twisted to appear like she was objecting to the call to prayer itself and repeated in the community and on social media, her legal team said.

Meliana was accused of committing blasphemy against Islam and convicted.

She was jailed for 18 months in August last year in a sentence that sparked outrage because it was considerably longer than jail terms given to the rioters.

Those who were responsible for the riots were given just one or two months in jail.

Senior members of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest moderate Muslim organisation, have said her remarks should not be considered blasphemy.

Meliana's first appeal, to a local high court, was denied in October last year, so she took the case to Indonesia's Supreme Court.

The Muslim majority country's top court announced on Monday that her appeal had been denied.

Meliana, an Indonesian woman of Chinese descent, has run out of legal options and must continue to serve her sentence.

Her trial judge has been arrested on suspicion of bribery in a case not directly related to hers.

Human Rights Watch has condemned the woman's conviction and sentence.

Andreas Harsono, a researcher with the organisation, tweeted: "Supreme Court upheld a jail sentence for a Buddhist woman convicted last year on blasphemy against Islam for complaining that her neighborhood mosque was too loud.

"It's another nail in the coffin of religious freedom and tolerance in Indonesia."

There are hundreds of thousands of mosques across the vast Indonesian archipelago and most use loudspeakers to play the ‘azan’ or call to prayer, which lasts a few minutes.

But many also play lengthy versions of prayers or sermons lasting over 30 minutes, which the Indonesian Mosque Council has deemed unnecessary.