BRITAIN: Britain hopes to send a top navy officer to Tehran to deliver a face-saving compromise that will ensure the release of 15 captive British naval personnel, a newspaper reported Sunday.
The British government will send the officer to Tehran to promise that the Royal Navy will never knowingly enter Iranian waters without permission, according to a plan cited by The Sunday Telegraph.
The compromise, which would involve dispatching a navy captain or a commodore to Iran, was raised at a meeting of a senior government crisis committee on Saturday, the newspaper reported.
Iran demands an apology after accusing the 15 sailors and marines of entering Iranian waters illegally on March 23.
But the British government insists that Iranian vessels “ambushed” the group while they were in Iraqi waters carrying out anti-smuggling operations in support of UN resolutions and the Iraqi government.
Prime Minister Tony Blair and Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett have been warned that the impasse may develop into a long stand-off. Privately, the paper said, officials are speculating that the crisis could continue for months.
Beckett has said that Britain has replied to a letter from the Iranian embassy in London, which urged the government to acknowledge that the sailors had trespassed and confirm that it would not happen again.
“Everyone regrets that this position has arisen. What we want is a way out of it. We want it peacefully and we want it as soon as possible,” Beckett said.
The newspaper quoted a defence official as saying that the plan held out some hope. “We are quite prepared to give the Iranians a guarantee that we would never knowingly enter their waters without their permission, now or in the future,” said the official.
“We are not apologising, nor are we saying that we entered their waters in the first place. But it may offer a route out of the crisis.”
Earlier Britain said it was concerned at Iranian “sabre-rattling” about possibly putting captured British naval personnel on trial and for the first time voiced regret the incident had occurred.
Iran’s ambassador to Moscow said the 15 Britons captured eight days ago could face punishment if found guilty of illegally entering the Islamic Republic’s territorial waters.
Britain insists the sailors were seized in Iraqi waters and Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett said she was worried by such talk.
Iran’s Moscow ambassador, Gholamreza Ansari, said in an interview broadcast by Vesti-24 television on Friday, according to a Reuters translation from the original Farsi: “If there is no guilt they will be freed but the legal process is going on and has to be completed and if they are found guilty they will face the punishment.”
Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on March 25 Iran was considering charging the sailors with illegally entering its waters.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry delivered a letter to Britain’s embassy in Tehran on Thursday, the first written communication between the two capitals since the crisis began.
The IRNA news agency said the Iranian message asked for “necessary guarantees that violations against Iranian waters would not be repeated”.
Beckett said: “We have made our response and we are now beginning to discuss. As you may know it’s a holiday period in Iran and it’s perhaps not too helpful.”
Iran displayed three of the detained Britons on television on Friday and released a letter from one saying she was being held because of “oppressive” British and U.S. behaviour in Iraq.
Meanwhile.US President George W. Bush said on Saturday that Iran’s detention of 15 British sailors and marines was inexcusable and called on Tehran to release “the hostages” immediately.
Bush said he supported British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s efforts to resolve the matter peacefully and rejected the idea of swapping Iranians held by the United States in Iraq for the detained Britons.
“The Iranians must give back the hostages. They’re innocent,” Bush told a news conference at the Camp David presidential retreat with visiting Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
“The Iranians took these people out of Iraqi waters. It’s inexcusable behavior.”
Meanwhile.more people in Britain oppose military action than support it to end the standoff over Iran’s capture of 15 British military personnel in the Gulf, a poll published at the weekend said.
A survey for an ICM poll published in The Sunday Telegraph found that 48 percent of voters rejected force even as a “last resort,” while 44 percent backed it if diplomacy failed.
London, Sunday, AFP, Reuters
No comments:
Post a Comment