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| Analysis: Is al-Qaida Iran's golden key?
TEHRAN, Aug. 11 (UPI) -- Iran has said it will try some prominent members of al-Qaida network it is believed to hold, sparking debate the Islamic Republic may be using the militants as a bargaining chip with the West. "If the nationality of some individuals is not known and no country accepts them, as the intelligence minister has said, we will take action ourselves," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi told reporters at a weekly news briefing Monday. Adaptive intelligence for a serious advantage: business, investment and technology- BizVantage! He said other al-Qaida members who were accused of committing crimes in Iran would stand trial here. Iranian Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi said Saturday that Tehran would try some al-Qaida operatives instead of swapping them with senior elements of the Iraq-based Iranian rebel group, the Mujahedeen-e Khalq. Among those held in Iran are believed to be three al-Qaida leaders: the network's No. 3, Egyptian-born Seif al-Adel, who has a $25 million bounty on his head; the group's spokesman, Kuwaiti-born Suleiman Abu Gheith; and Osama bin Laden's third son, Saad, who it is widely believed was being groomed to replace his father at the head of the organization. In addition, U.S. officials and the Arab media have reported Tehran also has custody of other senior members of the group: Abu Hafs, known as "the Mauritanian," Abu Musab Zarqawi, depicted by Washington as a key link between al-Qaida and deposed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, and possibly Mohammad al-Masri, an al-Qaida associate in East Africa, and Egyptian-born Ayman al-Zawahiri, considered the network's No. 2 and a close aide to bin Laden. Some top members of bin Laden's network have been stripped of their nationalities, complicating the process of their handover. Abu Geith, for instance, was stripped of his Kuwaiti nationality in October 2001 because of links to Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. Tehran says it has arrested some 500 "foreigners" on suspicion of links to al-Qaida. Some have been extradited to their countries of origin. "Since the fall of the Taliban (in Afghanistan in late 2001), we have arrested a large number of al-Qaida members, some of whom have been expelled or handed over to their country of origin," Iran's intelligence minister said July 23. "We are still holding many others, small and big," he added. Reacting to Iran's admission, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the important thing was what Iran would do with the detainees. "I think it is significant that they have now acknowledged rather publicly the presence and detention of al-Qaida members and how they dispose of these individuals, and what jurisdictions they turn them over to is something that remains to be seen," Powell said. Tehran has not named al-Qaida members it is believed to hold. "I am not in a position to announce who are among those (in custody), but this is a security matter, the publication of which in the media is not expedient," Asefi said. He also said reports that Abu Geith was in Iran was "an invented story which appeals to certain media, especially in Arab countries." Observers, however, say Iran may use the issue as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Washington. Tehran has rejected the allegation. "This is false news, invented outside (Iran) about al-Qaida," Asefi said. "We are serious in our fight against terrorism and we have turned back many of these individuals or returned them to their own countries." Although Iran denies it has linked the al-Qaida members with senior members of Mujahedeen-e Khalq, which is on the U.S. State Department's list of foreign terrorist organizations, it has demanded Washington take a firmer stance against the group. News reports say U.S.-led forces have disarmed the group in Iraq and are questioning its leaders to gather intelligence about Iran. Some analysts say Tehran's admission that it has al-Qaida members in custody may be an effort to ease international pressure following allegations it may be using its nuclear program as a cover to develop atomic weapons. Iran is under pressure, not only from the United States and Israel but also from the European Union, Japan and even Russia, to sign an additional protocol to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty that would allow snap inspections of its sites by the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency. The pressure also comes from Iran's role in Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as Tehran's human rights record. Early last month, the EU, Iran's largest trading partner, warned the Islamic republic that it would review relations unless Tehran cooperated fully with the IAEA. Japan also decided recently to link the signing of a lucrative oil deal, estimated at $2 billion, to greater transparency over Iran's nuclear program. Washington-Tehran relations were severed during the U.S. embassy hostage crisis in 1979-1980, but quiet meetings were held between the two countries over the past year. However, negotiations were broken off in mid-May after Washington said Iran-based al-Qaida members were behind a series of terrorist attacks against U.S. targets in Saudi Arabia. Iran has been engaged in negotiations with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt over the detainees, but Kuwait turned down a recent offer by Iran to extradite Abu Geith, said Kuwaiti sources. "Iran offered to hand over Abu Geith to us...But we don't want him. He is not a Kuwaiti citizen," Kuwait's Interior Minister Sheikh Nawaf al-Sabah was quoted by the Saudi Okaz daily as saying in late July. Fleeing the attack on Afghanistan, hundreds of al-Qaida members from all ranks crossed into Iran through the long porous border between Iran and neighboring Afghanistan and Pakistan. A Western source was quoted on Thursday as saying that Iran held the "golden key on the al-Qaida issue, and the United States knows it."
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