Posted on 10/28/2003 3:21:09 PM PST by anotherview
Oct. 28, 2003
Iran rejects U.S. demand to extradite al-Qaida operatives
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) Iran rejected a U.S. demand to hand over senior al-Qaida operatives in its custody, Tuesday, saying the terror suspects would stand trial in Iranian courts, state-run radio reported.
A day earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell insisted that senior al-Qaida operatives held by Iran should be turned over to their countries of origin or to the United States for interrogation and trial.
"Al-Qaida operatives currently in (our) custody have committed crimes in Iran," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi was quoted by the radio as saying. "They will be tried in Iranian courts and will be punished on the basis of the laws of the country." He said Iran would not reveal the number and names of al-Qaida suspects in custody for security reasons.
American counter-terrorism officials said last week that a handful of senior al-Qaida operatives who fled to Iran after the war in Afghanistan two years ago may have developed a working relationship with a secretive military unit linked to Iran's religious hard-liners.
U.S. intelligence suggests that al-Qaida figures in Iran include Saif al-Adl, a top al-Qaida agent possibly connected to May bombings in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Abu Mohammed al-Masri, wanted in connection with the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998; Abu Musab Zarqawi, whom some U.S. officials describe as the key link between al-Qaida and toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein; and Osama bin Laden's eldest son, Saad.
The al-Qaida operatives are believed to have fled to Iran from neighboring Afghanistan during the Taliban's fall in late 2001 or early 2002.
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