A mother and her two sons who made Shetland their home have finally had the nightmare prospect of being deported to Burma lifted.

It brings to an end a five-year battle by the island communities to persuade the authorities to let the Minn family stay.

Hazel Minn, 40, and her adopted sons Simon, 15, and Vincent, 14, were told on Tuesday they could stay in Shetland at Hillswick where they have been living with the boys' grandparents since May 2002.

The decision comes four years after a huge campaign in which almost 6000 Shetlanders, more than a quarter of the population, signed a petition demanding the family be allowed to stay in the isles.

It also followed another campaign in 2006 when thousands of Shetlanders rallied to stop the Home Office deporting local lifeguard and athlete Sakchai Makao to his native Thailand after he was convicted of fire-raising.

The outcome of the Minns' appeal remained unclear as recently as last month when they received a letter from the Home Office threatening to arrest them unless they completed certain forms within 21 days.

The news came as "a complete shock", Ms Minn said yesterday.

"I have not been able to stop worrying about it. Though I hoped for the best, I was prepared for the worst."

Ms Minn left Burma in 2002 after adopting her cousin's two sons, saying conditions had become too harsh under the military government and the boys had no future in a country where children as young as 10 are forced into manual labour.

A member of the persecuted Karen tribe, which lives in the southern half of Burma, she faced further problems with the government because she was a Christian working for a Baptist organisation translating the Bible.

She was threatened with deportation a year after she arrived in the UK and when her appeal was turned down a huge campaign was launched in Shetland to let her stay.

In December 2006, Ms Minn was interviewed at Lerwick police station where she was told a final decision would be taken soon.

"I was really scared and depressed and couldn't sleep. All I could do was pray and cry myself back to sleep. I worried about the boys and their education," she said.

"We have been on the television and in the news and we would be in a lot of trouble if we were sent back home. I would be arrested and put into prison.

"Now I can work and go to college in this country."

The boys, for whom English is now their main language, are delighted they can now think about their future and go on school trips abroad for the first time.

Simon Minn said the worry of being sent back to Burma rarely eased. "I just tried to forget about it, but it's at the back of my mind all the time," he said.

Alistair Carmichael, LibDem MP for Orkney and Shetland, who has been campaigning on behalf of the Minn family, said yesterday: "This is tremendous news which has been a long time coming. It is, however, worth the wait.

"I have no doubt the support Hazel received from the community in Shetland played a significant role in this decision.

"This is a victory not just for Hazel and her family but for the whole community."

The boys' grandfather by marriage, Bert Armstrong, said they had been poorly treated by the Home Office. "It's been absolutely terrible. It's just been one knock-back after another from the Home Office. I honestly believe one department doesn't know what the other department is doing."