Iran Takes British Hostages for 'Peaceful Purposes'
by Scott Ott

(2007-03-25) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that his forces took 15 British sailors and marines as hostages yesterday for “peaceful purposes,” and that no other nation has the right to determine whether Iran can “develop and test kidnapping technology.” ...

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Hostage update: British ambassador to Iran demands to see sailors
Allahpundit

He’s been told they’re in good condition but not where they are or whether he can visit them. And he wants that to change ASAP. Blair’s talking tough but his foreign ministry people are doing their best to downplay it, going so far as to pretend that the kidnapping is an isolated territorial dispute:

Lord Triesman said he had been assured the group was not being held hostage for political reasons as the UK joined other United Nations Security Council members in imposing tougher sanctions on Iran over its refusal to suspend its nuclear programme. “Our own view is that these things are not linked,” Lord Triesman said. He believed it was a “technical” dispute over whether - as Iran claims - the personnel had strayed into Iranian waters or - as the UK insists - were on the Iraqi side of the border.

They nabbed 15 members of the British military one day before a vote on UN sanctions and two days after the AP dropped a bombshell about Mahdi Army involvement with the Revolutionary Guard, and yet the Foreign Office would have us believe that one has nothing to do with the others? Seriously?

Meanwhile, Pajamas drops a mini-bombshell of its own: ...

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Cheney Allegedly Offers to Trade Carter for Hostages
by Scott Ott

(2007-03-25) — A source close to Dick Cheney said today that the vice president has suggested freeing 15 British sailors and marines from Iranian captivity by trading former President Jimmy Carter for the hostages.

The deal, which Mr. Cheney reportedly believes “has a certain poetic justice to it”, would ...

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Kharnival 300
Jules Crittenden

Mini-Kharnival starts with a poetry reading and a movie.

Mahmoud ”The Bard” Ahmadinejad: World has changed. No one gives in to literature of force!

Now we know why the mullahs have their turbans in a twist over that movie:   

American forces in Iraq now hold some 300 prisoners tied to Iran’s intelligence agencies, Pajamas Media learned from both diplomatic and military sources. 

And why this time, they may actually go head with the threat to try them for espionage. ...

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No Good Deed Goes Unpunished, Part 67C
Ed Morrissey

The assassination attempt on Iraq's deputy prime minister now looks like an inside job, and the perpetrator had already been suspected of being a security risk. However, since both men are Sunnis and related to each other, the erstwhile assassin never got searched before blowing himself up within feet of the politician:

The suicide attack against Iraq's Sunni deputy prime minister is now seen as an inside job carried out by a member of his own security detail — a distant relative who had been arrested as an insurgent, freed at the official's request, then hired as a bodyguard, a senior security official and an aide to the victim told The Associated Press on Sunday.

The assassin had served as al-Zubaie's bodyguard for a while, but had recently been removed from that assignment for being a troublemaker. No one has an explanation of what that specifically meant, but it apparently didn't rise to a level where Iraqi security would check him for explosives when he traveled with Zubaie. They never bothered to check his car, either, which looks like it was intended to serve as a backup plan in case the suicide vest didn't work. ...