Tehran Assails U.S. Arrests Of Iranians In Iraq Raids

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
New York Times
December 26, 2006
By Nazila Fathi
TEHRAN, Dec. 25 — Iran’s Foreign Ministry on Monday condemned the arrests of several Iranians by American forces in Iraq last week and warned that the arrests could have “unpleasant consequences.”
A Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, said the two Iranian diplomats and four other Iranians who were detained had been invited to Iraq by President Jalal Talabani to help with security issues.
“The Iraqi government is responsible for their release, and the occupying forces should be held responsible based on international regulations,” the ISNA news agency quoted him as saying.
The diplomats were turned over to the Iraqi authorities and then freed. The other four, still in custody, included senior military officials, the Bush administration said, and were still being held.
“This move is against international regulations and can have unpleasant consequences,” Mr. Hosseini said.
Referring to the men still being held as “Iranian diplomats,” he said the Foreign Ministry had summoned the Swiss ambassador, who looks after United States interests in Iran, to hear Iran’s protest over what he termed “the undiplomatic move by U.S. forces.”
The United States severed diplomatic ties with Iran after militant students attacked the United States Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and took its diplomats hostage.
The Iranians were arrested in two separate raids last week aimed at people suspected of conducting attacks on Iraqi security forces, senior Iraqi and American officials said.
 
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