Iran TV airs footage of U.K. sailors - Focus on Iran - MSNBC.com

Iran TV airs footage of U.K. sailors - Focus on Iran - MSNBC.com

Iran TV airs footage of U.K. sailors
Tehran claims sailors confessed to tresspassing, says woman will be freed
BREAKING NEWS
MSNBC News Services
Updated: 12:57 p.m. ET March 28, 2007
TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian state television showed video footage Wednesday of a British servicewoman and a group of seized British sailors and marines.

The video showed the sailors and marines eating. The woman, 26-year-old Faye Turney, was shown wearing a white tunic with a black headscarf draped loosely over her hair.

Turney was to be freed Wednesday or Thursday, the Iranian foreign minister told the Associated Press.

“Today or tomorrow, the lady will be released,” Manouchehr Mottaki said Wednesday on the sidelines of an Arab summit that he was attending in the Saudi capital.

"Obviously we trespassed," Turney said on the footage broadcast by Al-Alam, an Arabic-language, Iranian state-run television station that is carried across the Middle East by satellite. She was also shown in uniform eating with sailors and marines and at one point was shown smoking a cigarette with her eyes downcast.

"My name is leading sailman Faye Turney. I come from England. I have served in Foxtrot 99. I've been in the navy for nine years," she said.

It also showed what appeared to be a handwritten letter from Turney to her family. The letter said, in part, "I have written a letter to the Iranian people to apologize for us entering their waters."

Turney was the only person to be shown speaking in the video.

Tehran claims proof sailors trespassed
Iran's state television quoted an unnamed Iranian official on Wednesday as saying the first, technical phase of an investigation into the detentions of the British sailors was complete and had determined they were "definitely" in Iranian waters when seized.

The unnamed official also was quoted as saying that some of the detained British sailors had "confirmed they were in Iranian territorial waters and expressed regret over it."

One Iranian official said immediately after the detentions last week that all the British had confessed to being in Iranian waters, but Iran had not until now repeated that assertion.

"This case is completely provable," the unnamed official was quoted as saying, "and British officials were also informed about it."

British remain cautious
A British diplomat in Tehran said the embassy had not heard anything officially about plans to release Turney.

He said Britain’s ambassador to Iran was now in a meeting with a senior Iranian Foreign Ministry official, the third such meeting in as many days.

“We’ve had nothing officially,” he said.

The ISNA news agency earlier quoted Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini as saying: “This issue will be solved in a calm atmosphere. We can not predict how long it is going to take.”

The statement came shortly after Britain announced it would suspend bilateral business with Iran on all other issues until Tehran returns 15 British sailors and marines seized on Friday.

The Iranian government had not yet studied British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett’s announcement, Hosseini Matin, the Iranian Embassy’s first secretary, told The Associated Press. The Iranian Embassy had earlier released a statement saying the dispute over the sailors captured in disputed waters could be resolved, but Matin said the situation may have changed.

“The new situation needs new review,” he said.

A British Foreign Office spokesman, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the bilateral freeze meant that all official inward and outward visits will be stopped, the issuance of visas to Iranian officials suspended, British support for other events such as trade missions to Iran are put on hold and there will be no government-to-government business on any other issue.

Blair calls for more pressure
Earlier, Prime Minister Tony Blair said it was time to increase the pressure on Iran and the British military released what it said was proof that their boats were within Iraqi territorial waters when they were seized.

Britain’s military said that navy vessels were 1.7 nautical miles inside Iraqi waters when Iran seized the crew members.

Vice Admiral Charles Style told reporters that the Iranians had provided a position on Sunday — a location that he said was in Iraqi waters.

By Tuesday, Iranian officials had given a revised position 2 miles east, placing the British inside Iranian waters — a claim he said was not verified by global positioning system coordinates.

“It is hard to understand a legitimate reason for this change of coordinates,” Style said.


Britain and the United States have said the sailors and marines were intercepted Friday after they completed a search of a civilian vessel in the Iraqi part of the Shatt al-Arab waterway, where the border between Iran and Iraq has been disputed for centuries.

Iran has said that the British sailors and marines were being treated well, but refused to say where they were being held, or rule out the possibility that they could be brought to trial for allegedly entering Iranian waters.

Echos of past incident
In 2004 eight British sailors were captured as they were delivering a patrol boat to the Iraqi Riverine Patrol Service. Britain described the mission as "routine" but Iranian officials accused them entering Iranian waters illegally.

A day later, Iran announced that the soldiers would be put on trial, and Iranian television broadcast video of the soldiers blindfolded and sitting on the ground. Two of the sailors later read a statement of apology for entering Iran's territorial waters, saying it was a mistake.

The soldiers later told reporters they had been mistreated and subjected to mock executions.

The eight were eventually returned to British diplomats in Tehran, from where they were flown back to Iraq. Iran initially promised to return the seized boats, but later decided to keep them for display at Tehran's War Museum.

The Iranians also kept the crew's GPS equipment, and their coordinates have never been released.

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