Riyadh, Saudi Arabia — More than 100 Saudis are among the suspected al-Qaida and Taliban prisoners held by the United States at a Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Saudi Arabia's interior minister said Monday.
It was the most specific number given so far by Saudi officials, and it would mean that Saudi citizens make up the bulk of the 158 prisoners currently detained at Guantanamo.
Interior Minister Prince Nayef told reporters in Riyadh that the kingdom wants its detained citizens to be handed over so it can interrogate them.
"I know about them but we don't know the charges against them except that they were arrested in Afghanistan," Nayef said. "The issue of prisoners is important to us and we ask that they be handed over to us so we can interrogate them, since they fall under the kingdom's regulations."
At the Pentagon, spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said Monday that the nationalities of all the prisoners' had not yet been determined. U.S. officials have said they are considering sending some of the prisoners to their homelands on condition their governments punish them. Some may be tried by the United States for alleged involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks and other terrorism.
Asked about handing over Saudi citizens, Clarke said prisoners would be repatriated to "those countries that we feel will handle them appropriately."
"We have no desire to hold on to large numbers of detainees of any kind for any great length of time. But we want to make sure these people are not back out on the streets," she said.
Nayef said the Saudi government was in touch with the United States and hoped for U.S. cooperation concerning Saudis being held at Guantanamo.
Saudi Arabia, a close U.S. ally in the Middle East, has come under criticism in the United States from some who say the Saudi government has done too little to crack down on terrorists and extremists within its borders.
Fifteen of the 19 hijackers of the passenger jets which crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11 were Saudis, according to U.S. officials. Saudi officials insist no Saudi involvement has been proven. Osama bin Laden, whose al-Qaida terror network is accused in the Sept. 11 attacks, was a Saudi national until his citizenship was revoked in the 1990s.
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