DIYARBAKIR, Turkey (Reuters) - Fifty-six Kurdish mayors went on trial yesterday over a letter they sent to Denmark’s prime minister in a case that has raised concerns in the EU. 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 members of the Democratic Society Party (DTP) each face up to 15 years in jail if convicted. The trial was adjourned until November 21.

ISTANBUL (AFP) Organizers of the Turkish Grand Prix will appeal the 5-million-dollar fine that motoring sports’ world governing body, FIA, handed them over a podium controversy last month involving Turkish-Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat. Following a series of meetings here, the Turkish Automobile Sports Federation and co-organizers MSO agreed to appeal to FIA to reduce the fine, MSO managing director Baran Asena said, cited by NTV television.

US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld (photo) arrived in Albania yesterday to attend a meeting of defense ministers from Southeastern Europe. Rumsfeld flew from Montenegro following talks there on ways the Balkan state can take part in a US-led war on terror. (AFP)

A bridge linking two communities in an ethnically divided northern Kosovo town was closed hours after reopening when Albanian men attacked a Serb, international police said yesterday. The bridge over the Ivar River in Kosovska Mitrovica, 30 miles north of Pristina, had reopened on Monday. (AP)