Milan's Duomo cathedral may have been a terrorist target, reports say
Italian police have arrested three North Africans suspected of plotting to bomb Milan's metro and a cathedral in the north of the country.
Arrest warrants had been issued for five men from Morocco and Tunisia, who served as Muslim religious leaders in the city of Cremona.
The suspected cell members are under investigation for conspiracy to commit "international terrorism".
The arrests are part of a wider effort against militants in northern Italy.
Investigators say the region is home to Muslim groups with possible links to al-Qaeda.
'Subversive cells'
The chief prosecutor of Brescia, 100 kilometres (60 miles) from Milan, said the three arrests had been made over the last two days.
The crackdown targeted an alleged cell linked to a mosque in the city of Cremona.
Investigators believe the men planned to blow up the Milan metro stop below the cathedral in December 2002 and also to bomb the Cremona cathedral.
"The subversive cells have maintained themselves over time, working out of the mosque of Cremona and led by the successive imams," Brescia's attorney general said.
Another ex-imam of the Cremona mosque was arrested last October, after being accused by Morocco of links to the suicide bombings in Casablanca that killed 45 people in May.
The arrest warrants were reportedly drawn up on the basis of a series of wiretaps, as well as the testimony of a Tunisian man arrested for drugs trafficking.