Iranians Claiming Brits Were Committing Espionage

The Iranians, who entered Iraqi waters to detain 16 British sailors and Royal Marines, are now claiming that they are going to be tried for committing espionage against Iran.

What will the Brits do? This is an act of war, and the Brits and the Iranians surely know this. Not only that, but the Iranians appear to have invaded Iraq in order to precipitate this event.

So, what is the game the Iranians are playing? Is it to pressure the US to release five Iranians captured in Iraq earlier this year? That may be part of the plan.

A website run by associates of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, reported last night that the Britons would be put before a court and indicted.

Referring to them as “insurgents”, the site concluded: “If it is proven that they deliberately entered Iranian territory, they will be charged with espionage. If that is proven, they can expect a very serious penalty since according to Iranian law, espionage is one of the most serious offences.”

The warning followed claims by Iranian officials that the British navy personnel had been taken to Tehran, the capital, to explain their “aggressive action” in entering Iranian waters. British officials insist the servicemen were in Iraqi waters when they were held.

The penalty for espionage in Iran is death. However, similar accusations of spying were made when eight British servicemen were detained in the same area in 2004. They were paraded blindfolded on television but did not appear in court and were freed after three nights in detention.

Iranian student groups called yesterday for the 15 detainees to be held until US forces released five Revolutionary Guards captured in Iraq earlier this year.

Al-Sharq al-Awsat, a Saudi-owned newspaper based in London, quoted an Iranian military source as saying that the aim was to trade the Royal Marines and sailors for these Guards.

The claim was backed by other sources in Tehran. “As soon as the corps’s five members are released, the Britons can go home,” said one source close to the Guards.

He said the tactic had been approved by Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, who warned last week that Tehran would take “illegal actions” if necessary to maintain its right to develop a nuclear programme.

The waterway where the incident occurred, the Shaat al Arab, has long had a disputed border between Iran and Iraq and an outgrowth of that dispute led to the bitter and disastrous Iran Iraq war in the 1980s. While the article suggests that some Iraqis think the British sailors and Marines may have strayed into Iranian waters, the British say that satellite surveillance shows that the Brits were inside Iraqi waters at the time the incident occurred - just as they were when a similar incident occurred in 2004.

Also, that the Iranians would admit to attempting illegal actions in order to maintain its rights to develop a nuclear program that the Iranian leadership would most certainly consider using on its enemies within the region shows the desperation and insanity of hoping and wishing that diplomacy will succeed in stopping the Iranian nuclear ambitions.

The Iranians are not going to be deterred by sanctions. They'll wait out the sanctions and do everything imaginable to evade their effect. The Iranians are all but admitting that they will not adhere to agreements on their nuclear program that force it to stop work. That should be sending up red flags, but instead, the diplomats at the UN think that if they simply come up with the right mix of words, the problem will go away.

This incident shows that the Iranians are playing a very dangerous game and ratcheting up the pressure on the West - knowing that if they get the British government to cave on the issue of the sailors, they may similarly fold on the more important nuclear program matter. The Iranians are probing the West's commitment to containing Iran and are finding that the West is lacking.

Ed Morrissey notes that the Iranians are contemplating violating the Geneva Convention because they're trying to prosecute the 15 uniformed members of the British military for espionage, which is expressly prohibited by the Geneva Convention. Of course, it should be pointed out that the Iranians do not care much for international law and have no problem supporting international terrorist groups, using child soldiers (during the Iran/Iraq war) and have no concern for human rights of their own citizens, so violating the rights of those 15 British service members isn't going to raise their hackles. Of course, such violations wont get the kind of airplay either.

Others blogging the developing situation: Blue Crab Boulevard, AJ Strata, and Hot Air.

UPDATE:
Why are the Iranians so interested in getting back their five Revolutionary Guards captured by the US in Iraq? Could it be as simple as the fact that their spy/terrorist ring is being rolled up quite effectively? It may really be as simple as that.

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