Britain made an appeal for international pressure to be brought
to bear on Iran Thursday over the capture of 15 of its soldiers, a
move which caused Iran to cancel the touted release of one of the
captives.?
Iran's decision appeared to nix any chance of a swift resolution
to a crisis which has further enflamed a Middle-East already
fretting over nuclear ambitions, and sent the oil market
tumbling.
Britain maintains that the 15 sailors and marines were seized
last week in Iraqi waters and has produced GPS images to back up
this claim.
IRNA news agency quoted an Iranian naval official as rejecting
Britain’s allegations and stating the UK boats trespassed into
Iranian territorial waters on several occasions before being seized
and that taped evidence proved this.
"The release of a female British soldier has been suspended,"
Iran's Mehr news agency quoted military commander Alireza Afshar as
saying. "The wrong behavior of those who live in London caused the
suspension."
Oil prices rocketed to six-month highs as the world braced for a
potential suspension of Iranian oil supplies.
Last weekend, the UN slammed new sanctions on Iran over its
nuclear program, a move prompted by Washington and London pointing
the finger at Iran for supporting insurgents in Iraq.?
"With the excuse of controlling ships that go to Iraq, they want
to make it a norm to violate other countries' sovereignty," Ali
Larijani, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security
Council, said on state television. “But they should know that the
cost of this is not cheap."
Britain is looking to the Security Council to slam detention of
the sailors and government sources have revealed that Britain would
be considering a range of measures at an EU foreign ministers'
meeting this weekend.
Prime Minister Tony Blair's official spokesman said Britain was
not on a collision course with Iran and wished to resolve the
standoff swiftly.
Analysts have claimed Iran deliberately caused this wrangle to
remove focus from its nuclear energy program.
Britain has suspended all official travel between itself and
Iran and has voided all visa issues and supports for trade
missions, a move not emulated so far but strongly supported by
American and European allies.
"We have widened the net of arguing our case. First of all we've
brought in the EU. Today we're doing so at the UN," Blair's
spokesman said.
Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini was
quoted by IRNA news agency as saying that the "interference of
sides who are not related to the issue will not help resolve
it"
(China Daily via agencies March 30, 2007)
