England's Sun newspaper has information about the Iranian kidnapping of British sailors and Marines that I haven't seen elsewhere; it apparently comes from Whitehall:

Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi is the all-powerful chief of the Revolutionary Guards, the military fanatics holding our Royal Navy heroes.

Intelligence sources believe the kidnapping of 14 men and one woman last week could be Safavi’s revenge for a series of blows recently inflicted on him by the West.

His Guards train and fund Shiite Muslim insurgents to kill British and US soldiers in Iraq.

But Safavi’s evil campaign received a setback in December, when a UN resolution froze all his foreign assets over his role in Iran’s quest for a nuclear arsenal.

Then in January US special forces arrested five of his top lieutenants in Iraq. And last month one of his key intelligence colonels defected.

Furious Safavi — an ally of hardline President Mahmood Ahmadinejad — is keeping the hostages at a Guards barracks in Tehran, while coordinating the propaganda broadcasts, and refusing to give anyone else access.

A Whitehall source said yesterday: “The Iranian Foreign Ministry is unable to answer any of our ambassador’s questions about the captives because they simply don’t know themselves. It shows who’s running the show.”

I believe there were hints early on in the hostage crisis that Iran wanted to exchange the British sailors and marines for the Iranian intelligence officers who were captured in Iraq. If so, that would be consistent with the Sun's information.

UPDATE: From today's Telegraph>

US officials today ruled out a deal to exchange the 15 sailors for five Iranians held by US forces in Iraq.

Reports that such a swap could be the key to ending the hostages' ordeal were wrong, said US State department spokesman Sean McCormack. The five in the abortive swap were believed to be members of Iran's Revolutionary Guard seized in Irbil, Iraq, in January.

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Posted by John at 01:52 PM  |    |