Female Sailor to Be Released, British Release GPS Coordinates
Iran will free a detained British servicewoman on Wednesday or Thursday, the Iranian foreign minister told the Associated Press.
"Today or tomorrow, the lady will be released," Manouchehr Mottaki said Wednesday on the sidelines of an Arab summit that he was attending in the Saudi capital.
The woman, 26-year-old Faye Turney, is among 15 British sailors and marines detained by Iran in disputed waters off the Iranian-Iraqi coast last week, sparking a crisis between Iran and Britain. Britain insists the troops were in Iraqi waters, but Iran says they had crossed into its territorial waters.
Mottaki discounted the possibility of an escalation in the crisis, suggesting that the alleged entry into Iranian waters may have been a mistake.
"This is a violation that just happened. It could be natural. They did not resist," he said.
Mottaki denied claims by the British military that the vessels were in Iraqi waters, saying, "That's not true. It happened in Iranian territorial waters."
Vice Adm. Charles Style said the British vessels were 1.7 nautical miles inside Iraqi waters when Iran seized the sailors and marines on Friday. He gave the satellite coordinates of the British crew as 29 degrees 50.36 minutes north latitude and 048 degrees 43.08 minutes east longitude, and said it had been confirmed by an Indian-flagged merchant ship boarded by the sailors and marines.
I think Iran is starting to sweat. They're starting to release hostages, and I'm sure the rest will follow in the next few days. When Iran first gave the GPS coordinates of the British Sailors/Marines, it was actually inside Iraqi waters. They then changed the coordinates to put them .5 nautical miles in Iranian waters.
