Amman - The public prosecutor in the Jordanian capital Tuesday charged 17 Danish newspapers with defamation for reprinting cartoons deemed insulting to the Prophet Mohammed.

Prosecutor Hassan Abdullat also issued notification to 20 Danish editors and cartoonists to stand trial in Amman.

The lawsuit was filed in April by a coalition of Jordanian media outlets, unions and political parties, two months after Danish newspapers reprinted the cartoons that triggered widespread protests in the Muslim world when they first appeared in 2006.

"The notification will be communicated to the defendants by Jordanian authorities through the Danish embassy in Amman," said Zakaria al-Sheikh, head of the campaign entitled The Messenger Unites Us."

"If they fail to attend, new warrants will be issued through Interpol to make them appear," he added.

The organizers of the campaign said they were planning to launch a campaign on June 10 to boycott Danish and Dutch products. They also plan to take legal action against the Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders, who released a a short anti-Islam film on the internet in March. (dpa)