Tehran: Iran announced on Tuesday its first arrests over the shooting down of a Ukrainian airliner last week, as it struggles to contain the fallout from the disaster that sparked three days of protests.

At a televised news conference, the judiciary announced the first arrests had been made over the calamitous blunder, without specifying how many. "Extensive investigations have been carried out and some people have been arrested," said spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili.