Editorial - It is sad that the 15 British Captives caved in. Fear
for their lives should have been something they understood before they swore their oath
and put on their service uniforms. If they refused to apologize on Iranian TV and remained
silent.... would the Iranian Radicals have them tortured or beheaded? We think not. That
would have forced world opinion against their criminal activity and harsh military
retaliation, even Teddy would have belched. We hope there are enough Warriors left in the
Service that would have the courage to remain silent while giving the camera the 1,000
yard stare. The Iran Government breached the Geneva Conventions but they
don't have a Ted Kennedy in their ranks to cry foul...like the chicken
he is.
4-4-07 TEHRAN, Iran - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defused a growing
confrontation with Britain, announcing the surprise release of 15 captive British sailors
Wednesday and then gleefully accepting the crew's thanks and handshakes in what he called
an Easter gift. British Prime Minister Tony Blair expressed "profound relief"
over the peaceful end to the 13-day crisis. "Throughout we have taken a measured
approach — firm but calm, not negotiating, but not confronting either," Blair
said in London, adding a message to the Iranian people that "we bear you no ill
will."
The announcement in Tehran was a breakthrough in a crisis that had escalated over nearly
two weeks, raising oil prices and fears of military conflict in the volatile region. The
move to release the sailors suggested that Iran's hard-line leadership decided it had
shown its strength but did not want to push the standoff too far. Iran did not get the
main thing it sought — a public apology for entering Iranian waters. Britain, which
said its crew was in Iraqi waters when seized, insists it never offered a quid pro quo,
either, instead relying on quiet diplomacy.
Update March 28, 2007 - Iranian state TV showed video Wednesday
of 15 British sailors and marines who were seized last week, including a female captive in
a white tunic and a black head scarf who said the British boats had
“trespassed” in Iranian waters.
Britain called the broadcast “completely unacceptable” and said it was concerned
that the statements from sailor Faye Turney were coerced. The British government earlier
released what it called proof the boat crews were seized in Iraqi waters, and said it was
freezing all contacts with Iran except negotiations to release them.
The British military said its vessels were 1.7 nautical miles inside Iraqi waters when
they were taken Friday, and it released what it said were the GPS coordinates that proved
that. Several hours later, Tehran broadcast the video on an Arabic-language satellite
channel, along with a letter from Turney saying the sailors and marines were inside
Iranian waters when they were captured. “Obviously we trespassed into their
waters,” Turney said, sitting by herself against a floral curtain and
smoking a cigarette.
“They were very friendly and very hospitable, very thoughtful, nice people. They
explained to us why we’ve been arrested, there was no harm, no aggression,” she
said. Turney, 26, was also shown eating with several fellow sailors and marines.
What appeared to be a handwritten note from Turney to her family said, in part, “I
have written a letter to the Iranian people to apologize for us entering their
waters.” The video also showed a brief scene of what appeared to be the British crew
sitting in an Iranian boat in open water immediately after their capture.
Before the video was broadcast, a Blair spokesman said any showing of British personnel on
TV would be a breach of the Geneva Conventions.
News Archives -
Sunday Times March 25, 2007 Iran ‘to try Britons for espionage’
FIFTEEN British sailors and marines arrested by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards off the
coast of Iraq may be charged with spying.
A website run by associates of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, reported last
night that the Britons would be put before a court and indicted.
Referring to them as “insurgents”, the site concluded: “If it is proven
that they deliberately entered Iranian territory, they will be charged with espionage. If
that is proven, they can expect a very serious penalty since according to Iranian law,
espionage is one of the most serious offences.”
The warning followed claims by Iranian officials that the British navy personnel had been
taken to Tehran, the capital, to explain their “aggressive action” in entering
Iranian waters. British officials insist the servicemen were in Iraqi waters when they
were held.
The penalty for espionage in Iran is death. However, similar accusations of spying were
made when eight British servicemen were detained in the same area in 2004. They were
paraded blindfolded on television but did not appear in court and were freed after three
nights in detention.
Iranian student groups called yesterday for the 15 detainees to be held until US forces
released five Revolutionary Guards captured in Iraq earlier this year.
Al-Sharq al-Awsat, a Saudi-owned newspaper based in London, quoted an Iranian military
source as saying that the aim was to trade the Royal Marines and sailors for these Guards.
The claim was backed by other sources in Tehran. “As soon as the corps’s five
members are released, the Britons can go home,” said one source close to the Guards.
He said the tactic had been approved by Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader,
who warned last week that Tehran would take “illegal actions” if necessary to
maintain its right to develop a nuclear programme.
Iran denounced a tightening of sanctions which the United Nations security council was
expected to agree last night in protest at Tehran’s insistence on enriching uranium
that could be used for nuclear weapons.
Lord Triesman, the Foreign Office minister, met the Iranian ambassador in London yesterday
to demand that consular staff be allowed access to the Britons, one of whom is a woman.
His intervention came as a senior Iranian general alleged that the Britons had confessed
under interrogation to “aggression into Iran’s waters”.
Intelligence sources said any advance order for the arrests was likely to have come from
Major-General Yahya Rahim Safavi, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards.
Subhi Sadek, the Guards’ weekly newspaper, warned last weekend that the force had
“the ability to capture a bunch of blue-eyed blond-haired officers and feed them to
our fighting cocks”.
Safavi is known to be furious about the recent defections to the West of three senior
Guards officers, including a general, and the effect of UN sanctions on his own finances.
A senior Iraqi officer appeared to back Tehran’s claim that the British had entered
Iranian waters. “We were informed by Iraqi fishermen after they had returned from sea
that there were British gunboats in an area that is out of Iraqi control,” said
Brigadier-General Hakim Jassim, who is in charge of Iraq’s territorial waters.
“We don’t know why they were there.”
Admiral Sir Alan West, the former head of the Royal Navy, dismissed suggestions that the
British boats might have been in Iranian waters. West, who was first sea lord when the
previous arrests took place in June 2004, said satellite tracking systems had shown then
that the Iranians were lying and the same was certain to be true now.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article1563877.ece
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