Middle East News
Captured British sailor's Iran diary banned by ministry: Times
Apr 14, 2007, 14:07 GMT
London - The leader of the British crew that was captured and held in Iran for 13 days has been told by the Ministry of Defence that he may not now tell his story to the media in a third change of policy since the crew returned, The Times reported Saturday.
Lieutenant Felix Carman had written a 5,500-word diary of his experiences for The Times.
When Carman and the 14 other sailors returned from their captivity in Iran on April 5, they were told by the ministry that they could sell their stories to the press.
The policy met with outrage from the British public, and even Prime Minister Tony Blair said the decision was 'wrong.'
The ministry then backtracked and said the sailors could not sell their stories, but they could still speak to the press.
The most recent decision to bar the sailors from speaking to the media represents the third policy change by the ministry.
'We know this is madness, but we have to stop feeding the story. We know Carman is sensible, but we can't let him get his story out there because it will spark further interest when we are trying to dampen it down,' the newspaper reported one unnamed official as saying.
'There is a general climate of overexamining these issues, and we do not want to add to it. Maybe in the future, we will say yes (to publishing the diary) and it will be published, but not now,' the report quoted Lieutenant Commander Phil Rosendale as saying.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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Older Talkback
page: 1
It was once said that 'The sun never set on her majesty's (colonialist) empire.' Today, because of her history of racist imperialism, England's military is a barking, toothless female dog; no threat to anyone.
It is so tragic that the brittish commander sat in Iraq and ordered the sailors to go in the IRANIAN WATER. (The documents ahve been stolen and prove this fact) and let the poor britton get taken as prisoners.
The government has been so embarressed, that now they have lost rest of their logic and reasoning, POOR TONY does not know what to do and what to tell.
IT JUST TELLS THE BANKRUPT tony Bliar, and bushqoush
The sun has set upon britanica and will rise no more. The english encountered the iranians 500 years ago, an ancient people already, did those brave souls that ventured so far from mother england know that their empire would die upon those shores.
page: 1
Alan Hurd UKApr 14th, 2007 - 15:46:44
I think it is fair to describe the whole comical issue of our 15 sailors as Dinkies being led by Mules(our idiotic politicians ); we have been made the laughing stock of the world.
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