Tokyo Metro permits nude, pregnant Britney photo for ad

Subway officials in Japan have backtracked on their previous decision to censor a nude magazine photo of pregnant pop star Britney Spears destined for an advertisement.

Tokyo Metro said Thursday that it will allow the full presentation of the image, in which the pop singer — who is pregnantwith her second child— is seated nude, with her hands covering her breasts and her legs crossed.

Officials said the photo will be permitted, in its entirety, as an exception to its obscenity rule because it understood the intention was to portray a "happy mother" and not be sexually explicit.

"Our earlier request to cover the photo from the waist down was because of nudity, not because we had anything against pregnant woman," said Tokyo Metro spokesman Tatsuya Edakubo.

He added that in principle, Tokyo Metro does not accept nudity in ads for subway cars or in stations.

The Spears image is just one of the photos to be used in ads at the Omotesando subway station next week as part of an advertising campaign to promote the October issue of the Japanese edition of Harper's Bazaar.

The Spears photo is the same one the American fashion title used for its August cover.

Initially, Tokyo Metro objected to the Spears photo and asked the magazine's Japanese publisher, HB Japan Inc., to modify it.

HB Japan reluctantly agreed to black out the image from the waist down but said it was also planning to superimpose a message referring to the censorship.