Diyarbakir - Three Kurdish mayors whose arrest on charges of links to armed rebels provoked international concern were freed on bail yesterday and allowed to return to work. Turkish police used batons to disperse part of a chanting crowd welcoming the mayors as they stepped out of a high-security jail in Diyarbakir, regional capital of the mainly Kurdish southeast.
A state security court decided the men should be set free pending trial on charges of aiding Abdullah Ocalan's Kurdish guerrillas.