Iran Denies It Holds Waite, U.S. Hostages

Iran on Sunday denied reports that Terry Waite and some of the Americans kidnaped in Lebanon have been taken to Iran, while a London newspaper said that Waite’s captors believe he was involved in the U.S.-Iran arms-for-hostages deal.

The Church of England has denied that Waite, the personal emissary of the Archbishop of Canterbury, was in any way involved in the arms sale to Iran.

In Washington, White House spokesman Dan Howard called the London Sunday Telegraph report “balderdash.”

The newspaper said there was little chance that Waite might soon be released because he “has fallen victim to the widespread belief in Lebanon that he was acting as an agent of the United States” in his efforts to free Americans and other foreigners held in this country.

No Comment From Church

Church of England spokeswoman Eve Keatley had no comment in London on the report.

The Sunday Telegraph based its assessment of Waite’s status largely on interviews with militia officials and pro-Iranian sources in Muslim West Beirut--specifically on an inquiry by the Progressive Socialist Party, whose Druze militia guarded Waite until he disappeared Jan. 20.

Waite vanished in Beirut while trying to secure the release of hostages held by the pro-Iranian Islamic Jihad, or Islamic Holy War.

The Sunday Telegraph said Waite was mainly seeking freedom for Americans Terry A. Anderson, chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press, and Thomas Sutherland, acting dean of agriculture at the American University in Beirut.

It said that Islamic Jihad first accepted Waite’s assurances that he was acting solely as a representative of the church.

But later, the newspaper said, the kidnapers decided he was a U.S agent after being told that Waite had met in Washington with former White House aide Lt. Col. Oliver L. North.

North was fired after last November’s disclosure that U.S. arms were sold to Iran without congressional authorization.

In May, 1986, North and former National Security Adviser Robert C. McFarlane went to Tehran with a planeload of arms and spare parts in hopes of securing the release of American hostages. A planned second planeload was not delivered because no hostages were released.

The Sunday Telegraph quoted Jihan Zouheiri, the Progressive Socialist Party official who led an inquiry into Waite’s disappearance, as saying the kidnapers “knew something that only Terry Waite knew, and we didn’t. It was about ‘Irangate.’ ”

The newspaper quoted Hassan Sabra, who edits the Beirut weekly magazine Al Shiraa, which broke the story of the secret arms sale, as saying that Iran had ordered Waite kidnaped.

The semiofficial daily Al Ittihad of Abu Dhabi said Saturday that Waite twice was taken to Tehran for talks with Iranian officials and was close to freedom until Iranian leaders broke off contacts with him.

The Iranian Embassy in Beirut on Sunday denied the Al Ittihad report and a story in Saturday’s Al Shiraa saying that some of the eight missing Americans have been taken to Iran, where a powerful anti-American faction wants to put them on trial.

Al Shiraa said a more moderate Iranian group favors a trade of the hostages for frozen Iranian assets in the United States and U.S. weapons bought by pre-revolution Iran and never delivered.