[NYTr] Brits Were Using a Bad Map of Iran

[nytr at olm.blythe-systems.com]

sent by Tim Murphy

news.com.au - Jul 22, 2007
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22114048-1702,00.html

British map in Iran crisis 'inaccurate'

By Sophie Walker in London

A British map of the northern Gulf where Iran seized 15 naval personnel
in March was not as accurate as it should have been and Britain was
fortunate Iran did not contest it, a review into the crisis said.

The parliamentary report also said Britain's Foreign Office should name
the person who let two sailors sell their stories to the media, a
decision widely criticised for handing a propaganda coup to Britain's
enemies and embarrassing serving troops. The report by the Foreign
Affairs Committee (FAC) said the Foreign Office's overall approach
could not be faulted, but it said efforts should have been made to
contact key Iranian negotiator Ali Larijani sooner.

Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized 15 British personnel in the northern
Gulf in March sparking a 13-day standoff that ended when Iran's
President freed them, a day after Larijani spoke to a senior adviser to
then Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Mr Larijani, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, is regarded as a
pragmatist more amenable to exploring a bargain with the West than
hardliner President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Britain first applied to speak
to Mr Larijani seven days into the crisis. Britain insists the
personnel were in Iraqi territorial waters on a UN-backed mission when
they were seized. Iran says the British sailors had strayed into its
territory.

A British Ministry of Defence map published during the crisis showed a
territorial water boundary extending from the Shatt al-Arab waterway
that separates Iran and Iraq out to sea. However experts say no
maritime boundary between the two countries has been agreed and the
line was based on a 1975 land boundary that could have shifted over
time if the centre of the waterway had moved due to natural causes.

"We conclude that there is evidence to suggest that the map of the Shatt
al-Arab waterway provided by the Government was less clear than it
ought to have been," the report said.

"The Government was fortunate that it was not in Iran's interests to
contest the accuracy of the map."

'Uncertainties'

Britain and Iran provided different coordinates for the location of the
capture. The report did not make a definitive conclusion on the
accuracy of the map or whether the sailors were in Iraqi or Iranian
waters.

It quoted Martin Pratt, director of research at the International
Boundaries Research Unit at Durham University, as saying that if the
British coordinates were correct, it was difficult to see how Iran's
claim could be legitimate.

"Nevertheless, there are sufficient uncertainties over boundary
definition in the area to make it inadvisable to state categorically
that the vessel was in Iraqi waters," he was quoted as saying.

He said the map was "certainly an oversimplification" and could be
regarded as "deliberately misleading".

The Foreign Office said it was pleased the report praised its overall
approach. It was considering some recommendations and leaving others
for the Ministry of Defence to address. The Ministry of Defence also
said it would study the report.

Compiled by members of parliament, the report said it was "wholly
unsatisfactory" that a previous report into the affair had been unable
to say who was responsible for authorising payment for the stories of
the personnel after they were freed.

"We recommend ... the (Foreign and Commonwealth Office) set out who
specifically took the decision to authorise the naval personnel to sell
their stories to the media," it said.