Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen wanted the TV station to keep running

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen wanted the TV station to keep running

Photo © European Commission



Fifty-six Kurdish mayors have gone on trial in Turkey, charged with aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation. The mayors, from Turkey's largest Kurdish party, are charged by state prosecutors with "knowingly and willingly" helping Kurdish rebels when they urged Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen not to close Danish-based Kurdish broadcaster Roj TV.
The government in Ankara says the station is a mouthpiece for the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Forty-five of the mayors attended the opening hearing.
Mr Rasmussen had earlier expressed his outrage over the indictment.
"I find it rather shocking," he told the Danish media in June. "It is shocking that it can take place in a country which is seeking EU membership."
The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984 with the aim of carving out an ethnic homeland in the southeast. More than 30,000 people have been killed in that conflict. The EU and the United States, as well as Turkey, view the PKK as a terrorist organisation.