US Sailors Detained In Gulf Released By Iran

There are conflicting messages from Iran, which initially accused the sailors of spying and demanded an apology from the US.

Nine men and one woman were detained by Iran.

Ten American sailors who were detained by Iran after their vessels strayed into Iranian waters have been released unharmed.

The nine men and one woman were interrogated and held overnight on Farsi Island in the Gulf, where the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) have a base.
In a statement broadcast on state television, the IRGC said the crews had been freed.
Washington confirmed their safe release and said the US personnel left the area in the vessels they were picked up in.

The US sailors were being held on Farsi Island in the Gulf

The Pentagon said the US Navy was investigating how the sailors came to be in Iranian waters, adding there were no indications they were harmed while in detention.
It lost contact with the patrol boats as they moved through the Gulf between Kuwait and Bahrain on Tuesday.

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Early reports suggested at least one of the US vessels drifted after developing mechanical problems.

There were conflicting messages from the Iranians, who initially accused the sailors of snooping, before appearing to back down.

General Ali Fadavi, Navy chief of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard, confirmed a "broken" navigation system caused the boats to stray into Iranian waters.

He said investigations had found "this trespassing was not hostile or for spying purposes".

However, earlier, he said Tehran had asked Washington for an apology for "violating" Iran's territorial waters.

He said a US aircraft carrier in the Gulf had acted "provocatively and unprofessionally" for 40 minutes by carrying out air and sea manoeuvres after Iran arrested the American sailors.

The tension rattled nerves days ahead of the expected implementation of July's landmark nuclear accord with Tehran, which Secretary of State John Kerry helped broker with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif.

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Sky's US Correspondent Amanda Walker said: "The nuclear deal is very significant in this and has been years of very meticulous negotiations. It means Iran will freeze its nuclear assets in return for sanctions being lifted."

Sky's Diplomatic Editor Dominic Waghorn added: "Behind the scenes there will have been a lot of diplomatic pressure from the Americans, but also from John Kerry's counterpart, the Iranian foreign minister, who he has been working closely with on the Iranian nuclear negotiations for years, to try and bring about a speedy resolution."

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On Tuesday night White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Washington had "received assurances from the Iranians that our sailors are safe and that they will be allowed to continue their journey promptly".

But a statement from the IRGC said: "What others say about sailors' prompt release is their speculation and we don't confirm or deny it."

Spokesman Ramazan Sharif added: "If, during the interrogation, we find out that they were on an intelligence gathering mission, we will treat them differently."

Iran's semi-official Fars news agency said forces had detained the vessels after they "illegally" entered Iranian territorial waters in the Gulf.

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The crews were on riverine patrol boats, which are high-speed vessels used by the US Navy and Marines to patrol rivers and coastal waters.

President Barack Obama was briefed on the situation - just hours before he delivered his final State of the Union address to Congress.

Tuesday's incident follows Iran's launch of a test rocket near US warships passing through the Strait of Hormuz in late December.

In March 2007, Iranian forces seized 15 British servicemen in the mouth of a waterway separating Iran and Iraq.

They were held for 13 days, in a diplomatic crisis that at the time bordered on farce.