(Adds prosecutor in par 5, lawyer for Zoe's Ark in paras 7-8)

By Betel Miarom

N'DJAMENA, Nov 2 (Reuters) - A group of 16 Europeans detained in eastern Chad for trying to take 103 children out of the African country illegally were flown under tight security to the capital N'Djamena on Friday to face trial.

The nine French and seven Spanish nationals flew aboard a Chadian military transport plane from the eastern town of Abeche, where they were arrested last week. Chad has brought abduction and fraud charges against them, saying they had attempted to fly the children to Europe without permission.

After arriving in the dusty western capital, the accused were driven under military escort to the central courts building to appear before Chad's chief prosecutor and the investigating judge handling their case.

One of the French, photographer Jean-Daniel Guillou, shouted "I am being detained illegally" to other reporters.

If convicted, the main accused face possible forced labour terms of five to 20 years. Assistant public prosecutor Masgaral Tangar said the authorities would start taking formal statements from the accused on Saturday.

Six of the French are members of a group called Zoe's Ark which has said it intended to place orphans from neighbouring Sudan's war-torn Darfur region with European families for foster care. Three others are journalists.

"Can you blame them for having thought at a certain moment in time that they would be able to save more than 100 children from true hell?" said Gilbert Collard, a lawyer for Zoe's Ark, speaking to reporters in Paris.

"If they were wrong to believe this, to dream about this, if they were wrong to hope this -- does this mean they deserve forced labour?"

Contradicting the "war orphans" description of the children given by Zoe's Ark, U.N. and Chadian officials say most of the infants, aged one to 10 years, had come from families including at least one parent living on the violent Chad-Sudan border.

The Spanish crew of the plane chartered by Zoe's Ark to fly the children and a Belgian pilot are among those detained.

"BAD DREAM"

The transfer from Abeche took place after Chad's Supreme Court ruled that an N'Djamena court should handle their case.

President Idriss Deby has held out the hope that the French reporters and the air hostesses from the Spanish crew could be released soon if it is proved they were not directly involved.

The affair is an embarrassment to former colonial ruler France, which is an ally of Deby and has troops and aircraft stationed in the landlocked country.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has personally appealed to Deby to free the French journalists and urged a mutually satisfactory solution, "so that no one loses face".

In a message sent to his family by e-mail via the French embassy in Chad, photographer Guillou described his detention as "a bad dream". "I'm in good health and good spirits," he said.

Protests over the case of the 21 girls and 82 boys have taken place in Sudan and Chad, some directly criticising France.

Deby has said the case will not affect France's relations with Chad or French-sponsored plans to deploy a European Union peacekeeping force in eastern Chad to protect refugees.

Some of the children told journalists they were lured from villages on the Chad-Sudan border with offers of sweets or schooling. Some parents said they were persuaded by foreigners to give up their children for promised education in nearby towns, but no one had mentioned flying them to France.

Some French families have said they were waiting to foster Darfur orphans evacuated by Zoe's Ark and that they had paid up to 2,000 euros or more as a "donation" towards costs.

Foreign relief workers fear the case could tarnish their image among the local population in eastern Chad, where around 400,000 Sudanese refugees and displaced Chadian civilians have fled several years of political and ethnic conflict. (Additional reporting by Stephanie Hancock in Abeche, Alain Amontchi in N'Djamena, Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva, Thierry Chiarello in Paris and Claude Canellas in Bordeaux)

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