U.S. Troops Arrest Members of Iran Ministry in Baghdad

New York Times

BAGHDAD, Wednesday, Aug. 29 — An Iranian Energy Ministry delegation was arrested by American troops at a hotel in central Baghdad during an official visit to Iraq, the Iranian state news agency, IRNA, and hotel staff said Tuesday night.

American forces confirmed that a group of Iranians was detained after coalition forces searched them and their Iraqi escorts at a checkpoint, found unauthorized weapons in their vehicles and confiscated them.

The American statement did not mention the hotel, but it is near the checkpoint on the east bank of the Tigris where United States forces said the group was stopped and searched.

Staff at an Iraqi state-owned hotel called the Sheraton Ishtar said Wednesday that the delegation was detained while the members were eating dinner in the ground floor restaurant, where they had apparently proceeded from the nearby checkpoint.

They said six Iranians were led away blindfolded and handcuffed shortly after 10 p.m. Hotel officials said the delegation checked into the hotel on Monday bearing a letter of invitation from the Iraqi Electricity Ministry.

The detentions are certain to increase tensions between Iran and the United States, which has repeatedly said that Iran arms and finances Shiite militias attacking American and Iraqi forces in Iraq.

Iran has denied the accusations, and has protested the arrest of five Iranians by American troops in northern Iraq in January. The United States has said the five had links to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. Tehran has denied the accusation, saying they were diplomats.

Mohaned Abed, the Sheraton’s night manager, identified the members of the Iranian delegation from hotel records as Jamal Bayati, Abathar Mirzani, Mohsen Ashouri, Saed Raai, Hassan Tharif and Bahmatullah Muradi, who was accompanied by his wife.

Mr. Abed, 39, said 14 people had been detained: six members of the delegation, Mr. Muradi’s wife — who was not handcuffed or blindfolded — and seven Iraqis who accompanied them. They included drivers and interpreters; the Iranians appeared to speak little or no Arabic, Mr. Abed said.

“The American soldiers arrived about 9.30 p.m., entered the hotel and their commander asked me about the Iranian delegation, how many they were, their room numbers and did I have a copy of their room keys,” he said. “I told him that the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity had invited them, that they were guests of the ministry and that we had a letter from the ministry confirming this.”

Mr. Abed said the soldiers entered the al-Warkaa restaurant on the ground floor where the Iranians were having dinner, brought them into the lobby and questioned them. “After about 15 or 20 minutes they gathered the Iranians’ personal belongings, put them in plastic folders, put blindfolds on their eyes and then accompanied the delegation outside the hotel,” he said.