Pro-Iran Group in Beirut Says It Kidnaped Cicippio

A pro-Iranian Shia Muslim group calling itself the Revolutionary Justice Organization claimed responsibility Wednesday for the kidnaping of American accountant Joseph J. Cicippio. It also said it was holding a Frenchman whose abduction had not been reported previously.

The claims came in a handwritten Arabic statement, accompanied by pictures of the two men in captivity, which was delivered to the independent Beirut newspaper An Nahar shortly before dawn.

“The Revolutionary Justice Organization announces it kidnaped American spy Joseph Cicippio from West Beirut and the French spy Marcel Coudre, who worked for the French intelligence service, from East Beirut,” the group said.

The statement said the captives will be referred to a “revolutionary justice court” for trial as spies.

It also accused the United States, France and Israel of “preparing for an aggression against our oppressed people under the pretext of terrorism.” And it charged that the French government reneged on unspecified pledges allegedly made in negotiations to resolve previous kidnapings.

The Revolutionary Justice Organization previously claimed responsibility for the abduction of four French television crewmen on March 8, two of whom were released June 20.

Cicippio, 56, from Norristown, Pa., was kidnaped Sept. 12 by four gunmen on the campus of the American University of Beirut, where he was the acting comptroller.

The Revolutionary Justice Organization said it kidnaped Coudre in Christian East Beirut. It did not say when or give further details.

In Paris, a French Foreign Ministry official disclosed that a French citizen named Marcel Khodari, who had been living in Beirut, disappeared in February. The official would not say whether Khodari might be the Coudre mentioned in the statement.

A French Embassy official in Beirut said he had no record of a Frenchman named Marcel Coudre being in Lebanon.

Lebanon’s General Security Department said no one by the name of Coudre held a permit to live in Lebanon or had entered the country since 1980.

An An Nahar editor, speaking on condition of anonymity, said an envelope containing the statement and photographs of Cicippio and Coudre in captivity was delivered to the newspaper’s office in West Beirut.

Coudre, looking haggard but clean shaven, wore a white undershirt.