What is Tony Blair waiting for?

 From the Associated Press:

Iran may delay the release of the female British sailor if Britain takes the issue to the U.N. Security Council or freezes relations, the country's top negotiator Ali Larijani said Thursday. ... On Wednesday, Britain announced it was freezing relations with Iran.

The Daily Mail published this photo, from Tehran, saying that "The release of kidnapped British sailor Faye Turney is on hold after Iran accused Britain of having an "incorrect attitude".

Yesterday, the AP published this:

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki backed off predictions that Turney could be freed Wednesday or Thursday, saying Iran will look into releasing her "as soon as possible."

Asked when Iran would release Turney, Mottaki told the Associated Press, "We will look into this as soon as possible."

He said earlier reports that he had said she could be freed Wednesday or Thursday were incorrect. "I was probably misquoted," he said.

...Mottaki accused the West of trying to "blackmail" Iran by politicizing the detention.

"Our policy of the past 27 years has been not to give in to blackmail or pressure. They want to make it a political and propaganda issue, this is their goal," he said.

Also:

Students staged a mock trial on Tuesday for 15 British sailors and marines Tehran says were seized inside Iranian territorial waters, reported the student news agency Isna.

It said the "symbolic trial" was held in the south-western border town of Shalamsheh, the scene of fierce fighting in Iran's eight-year war with neighbouring Iraq from 1980 to 1988.

"The prosecutor examined the crimes and acts of oppression perpetrated by British colonialism," said the news agency, adding that the summing up was greeted by chants of "Death to America" and "Death to Britain".

Isna said the students denounced "the British sailors who violated (Iran's) territorial waters" and demanded "they be punished".

Throughout all of this, the 14 MALE sailors and their possible fate has not been mentioned. Is Blair waiting until Arab television broadcasts a video of someone being raped or beheaded, before taking genuine action to save these sailors, who were acting on behalf of the British government? A special ops mission should have been mounted before now, to "extract" these people. Blair's Chamberlain-style dawdling is going to get someone killed.

Tehran has been pushing the edge of the envelope for some years. This capture, coupled with their Prime Minister's abrupt change of plans to visit the UN, ought to be the last straw.

tags: iran  world war 3  

links: digg this    del.icio.us    technorati    reddit