WASHINGTON: Iran has released a group of 10 US sailors who had been held by the country since Tuesday, US officials said on Wednesday.
The sailors were held after the Iranian military seized two US Navy boats on the Irans Farsi Island in the middle of the Gulf.
“Our technical investigations showed the two US Navy boats entered Iranian territorial waters inadvertently,” Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) said in a statement carried by state television.
“They were released in international waters after they apologised,” it added. Shortly after their release, the Pentagon said that there were no indications that the 10 US sailors were harmed while in Iranian custody.
The carefully worded statement did not say how the sailors and their two boats ended up being detained by Iran, saying only that “the Navy will investigate the circumstances that led to the sailors’ presence in Iran”.
Secretary of State John Kerry had been on the phone with Iranian officials in Tehran attempting to gain the release. Officials said the Americans were on a training mission when their boat experienced mechanical difficulty and drifted into Iranian-claimed waters and was seized by the Iranian coast guard.
Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook earlier told the media that the boats were moving between Kuwait and Bahrain when the US lost contact with them.
