The long-arm of the law triumphed anew as Japanese authorities revealed on Monday the arrest and detention of a female suspect tagged as one of the principal perpetrators in the 1995 nerve gas attack that killed 13 people in Tokyo.

Local police identified the suspect as 40-year-old Naoko Kikuchi, said to be a prominent member of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo (Supreme Truth in English), which deployed sarin gas on Tokyo's subway system.

The attack was carried out on orders of Aum leader Shoko Asahara, whose teachings had attracted the attention of young and educated Japanese, including Ms Kikuchi, who was on her early twenties when she joined the cult.

Mr Asahara was arrested months after the attack, which Japan regards as the worst wholesale murder incident the country has ever seen on its modern history.

The cult guru currently awaits execution by hanging, media reports said.

According to Agence France Presse (AFP), Ms Kikuchi was tracked down by authorities on information provided by her neighbours.

She was collared in a house in Sagamihara, located in the Kanagawa Prefecture, west of Tokyo.

Ms Kikuchi gave up immediately and without any incident, local media reports indicated.

The suspect, according to Jiji News Agency, appeared remorseful after 17 years on the run, telling police officers that she was "sorry for running away for a long time."

She pledged full cooperation to authorities, the news agency added, and stressed that she no longer adhered to the teachings of Mr Asahara, which prompted her involvement in the Tokyo subway attack.

"I'm relieved that I don't have to run away anymore," AFP reported Ms Kikuchi as saying when arrested by Japanese police officers.

Initial information provided by local police showed that Ms Kikuchi admitted being a member of Aum Shinrikyo but insisted that she had no direct participation when sarin gas, which paralyses the nervous system, was released was released by cult members in 1995.

"It is true that I was involved in producing sarin gas, but I did not know what we were making at that time," police authorities reported Ms Kikuchi as saying following her arrest.

"I will tell you everything," the suspect added.

Police said she assumed the name Chizuko Sakurai while eluding arrest and was living with a man, whose name was withheld by authorities at this time, when officers swooped down on the two's residence.

The man was detained too and faces charges of harbouring a criminal, according to The Japan Times.

Ms Kikuchi's partner had previously discovered her true identity but opted not to alert authorities, the online publication said.

Her arrest came as another suspect, 47-year-old Makoto Hirata surrendered December last year, leaving only one suspect, who AFP identified as Katsuya Takahashi, still on the loose.