Hostage crisis hits sticking point

Press, 18 February 1980, Page 9

Hostage crisis hits sticking point

NZPA-Reuter : London President Carter’s reluctance to criticise American support for the ousted Shah’s rule in Iran has emerged as a sticking point in efforts to free the American diplomats held hostage in Teheran.

. The White House said at the week-end. that Mr Carter had told American editors he did not think the time was right to denounce past American policy.

But Iranian leaders made clear that the self-criticism they have called for from the United States is a key to the release of the hostages.

Militant students have been holding 50 Americans at the United States Embassy in Teheran since November 4.

The Iranian President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr said in an interview seen on Greek television that the release of the hostages depended on a change in the psychological and political climate.

He said: “In order to change this climate, the United States must condemn its policy in the past and undertake the obligation not to intervene both for the present and the future in Iran’s affairs.”

Mr Bani-Sadr added: “When the climate, changes, then the attitude towards the issue of the hostages will change as well.” He said he had opposed the hostage-taking by militant Islamic students from the outset. “But it’s something which has happened so we must safeguard the prestige of Iran.”

Mr Carter voiced his reluctance to accede to this demand in the text of his

meeting with magazine editors released by the White House.

He expressed regret for “misunderstandings” between Iran and the United States, but added: “I don’t think it is good at this sensitive moment to resurrect an analysis of the last 35 ybars of Iran’s history ...” he said. '<■ It was not clear whether President Bani-Sadr 'was aware pf. Mr Carter’s point of view when he told a television interviewer: . “I’ve been told that one of the conditions, which concerns the United States condemning its past record, is humiliating for the United States. “We can say that we are pleased to confess our past mistakes . . . How can I tell the students to release the hostages, just because the United States wants it? They will certainly not do it.” Most Iranians regard an act of contrition by the United States as important. They blame Washington for restoring the Shah and overthrowing'the Government of the late Mohammad Mossadeq in a 1953 military coup. More recently, they hold Washington responsible for training the Shah’s hated political police, the Savak, and for forcing , upon Iran huge quantities - of . American arms designed to make the Shah the West’s policeman in the Gulf region. . ‘ Many Iranians, convinced

that the Islamic revolution is threatened from abroad, believed that the United States was preparing a restoration similar to the 1953 coup when it admitted their former ruler for medical treatment ‘last October, despite Washington’s publicly-stated acceptance of the Iranian revolution.

Iranian spokesmen held out little hope that the hostages would be freed before a United Nations commission which is to investigate the Shah’s rule has completed its report. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman said the commission, which is being assembled by the United Nations Secretary-General (Dr Kurt Waldheim), was expected in Teheran within four days.

United Nations sources said that its members would be Algeria’s United Nations Ambassador (Mr Mohammed Bedjaoui), the former President of Bangladesh, Mr Abu Sayeed Choudhury, a French lawyer, Louis Edmond Pettiti, a Syrian foreign affairs adviser, Adib Daoudi, and the former Venezuelan Ambassador to the United States, Andress Aguilar, The Iranian Foreign Minister (Mr Sadeq Qotbzadeh) told journalists in Paris that the hostages would not be freed until the commission’s investigation was . over. He expected its work to take 10 days.