TEHRAN - Iran is still investigating several people it has arrested on suspicion of being Al-Qaeda members or sympathisers, Intelligence Minister Ali Yunessi said on Wednesday.
"The cases of those who were supposed to be tried in Iran have not yet been completed," Yunessi told reporters after a weekly cabinet meeting.
He gave no further details.
After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and the subsequent toppling of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, Iranian officials announced that a number of fugitive Al-Qaeda members had been arrested.
And in 2003, the Islamic republic declared it was also holding senior members of Osama bin Laden's network. Officials have cited national security as the reason for not divulging the identities of those detained.
Iran also said that those Al-Qaeda operatives not extradited to their country of origin or deemed to have acted against the Islamic republic's national security -- a charge that can carry the death penalty -- would be tried in Iranian courts.
The United States has accused Iran of harbouring and not cracking down on al-Qaeda fugitives.
05/25/2005 13:32 GMT