ROTTERDAM, 15 nov (AFP) - A Rotterdam court has extended by 10 days the provisional detention of 22 members of Turkey's outlawed Kurdish separatist PKK organization who were arrested in a southern Dutch village last week, the state prosecutor's office said Monday.
"The provisional detention of 22 people has been extended," spokesman Wim de Bruin said.
The court decided that nine other suspected terrorists also arrested last Friday should remain under preventive detention for an additional three days.
Meanwhile the prosecutor's office said the three owners of a camp site in the village of Liempde, where 29 members of the Kurdistan Workers Party were arrested Friday, were released and two other persons who were in the country illegally were turned over to immigration police.
Friday Dutch police arrested a total of 38 people as part of a large-scale probe of the PKK in the country.
Police arrested 29 people in Liempde and nine in other locations in the Netherlands. Ten houses were searched and police seized night-glasses, documents and a fire arm.
Because the PKK is on the European Union list of terrorist organisations the Dutch said the people were arrested on suspicion of belonging to a terrorist organisation.
The PKK, now also known as KONGRA-GEL, waged a bloody 15-year war for self-rule in the mainly Kurdish eastern and southeastern parts of Turkey -- claiming more than 36,000 lives -- before announcing a unilateral ceasefire in 1999.
The group called off the truce in June this year, threatening to carry out attacks and warning tourists and investors to stay away from the country.
Since then, there has been a sharp increase in clashes between the rebels and Turkish government troops.
11/15/2004 18:30 GMT - AFP