ASSOCIATED PRESS

AMMAN: Jordan’s state security court Wednesday began the trial of 150 Muslim hard-liners charged with attempting to undermine the country’s security and injuring 83 policemen during a protest.
Of those charged, only 98 defendants appeared in court, while 52 men are being tried in absentia.

The defendants, who remain in custody during the proceedings, were arrested in mid-April, when hundreds of Muslim hard-liners known as Salafis clashed with police in the eastern Jordanian city of Zarqa during a protest.
The rally called for the release of fellow Salafi prisoners and the establishment of an Islamic state – a demand the Jordanian government sees as a call to topple King Abdullah II.

The government charges the men attempted to undermine Jordan’s security by conspiring against the safety of citizens and the police. They are also accused of stabbing unarmed policemen with swords and endangering local residents.

If convicted, they face up to 15 years in prison.
The men have also been charged with adopting the militant “takfiri” ideology of Islam, which is illegal in Jordan. The extremist doctrine allows for the killing of infidels and regards even nonmilitant Muslims as such. Authorities often accuse Salafis of espousing “takfiri” teachings.

While Jordanians have not called for regime change as seen during uprisings in other Arab countries this year, there have been dozens of protests across the country to press for greater freedoms.
The city of Zarqa, where the April clashes took place, was the hometown of slain Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Iraq in 2006.

Several members of Zarqawi’s tribe, known as the Khalayleh, were listed as defendants in Wednesday’s closed-door session.
The proceedings appeared to be chaotic. Soon after the trial started, the entire defense team walked out to protest the trial’s venue, according to defense lawyer Hatem Guwayreh.

He said the authorities had designated a correctional facility some 70 kilometers southeast of the Jordanian capital for the trial, instead of its usual court venue in Amman.
He also said the defendants could not enter their pleas because several defense attorneys were absent.