Sunday April 4, 2004

Italian cops detain 106 militant suspects

ROME: Italian police detained more than 100 people suspected of having links to Muslim militants in co-ordinated swoops across the country on Friday, an interior ministry spokesman said.

Working with the secret service, police detained 106 people, most of them Moroccan immigrants. Fifteen of those held were to be deported because their papers were not in order, the spokesman said.

“This was a preventative operation, scrupulously conducted and based on accurate information,” Italian news agency Ansa quoted Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu as saying.

The report said in total 161 suspects were targeted, but did not say if any charges had been brought against the detainees. – Reuters