Tunis — Government asserted that Reuters news agency's report, on Saturday, regarding the authorisation granted to FBI investigators to interview a detained Tunisian suspected of having played a part in the attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi "is not accurate and it politicises the judicial procedures which are only enforcing letters rogatory binding the two States."

Government specifies, in a communiqué, that judicial co-operation between Tunisia and the United States in this precise case, like in others, "is grounded in the provisions of international, regional and bilateral conventions and in Tunisian law, in total respect of national sovereignty and in materialisation of collaboration between states in fighting crime and identifying, prosecuting and sanctioning its perpetrators."

Tunisia, attached as it is to honour its commitments by virtue of these conventions, "endeavours to reinforce co-operation with its different partners and to prevent that the guilty escapes penalty."

Government also points out that identifying co-operation formulas and mechanisms to implement the letters rogatory sent by the American justice to Tunisia "is within the exclusive competence of the judiciary parties entrusted with the file."

It is worth recalling that Reuters posted, on Saturday, a news story reporting that U.S. officials had stated that the Tunisian authorities "agreed to let the FBI interrogate an Islamist militant detained in Tunisia and suspected of having played a role in the September 11 attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi."