2 U.S. Captives Are Reportedly Moved to Iran

Iranian Revolutionary Guards have smuggled two American hostages from Lebanon to Iran, hiding them in coffins part of the way, a Shia Muslim source said Tuesday.

A top aide to President Reagan expressed skepticism about the report, and Iran’s foreign minister denied it.

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told the Associated Press that the Americans are “probably Terry Anderson and Thomas Sutherland,” who were seized separately more than two years ago by Shia extremists loyal to Iran. The source has been reliable in the past on information regarding foreign hostages.

Anderson, now 39, AP’s chief Middle East correspondent, was kidnaped in March, 1985, in Muslim-dominated West Beirut. Sutherland, now 55, acting dean of agriculture at the American University of Beirut, was seized in June, 1985.

Other reports over the last few weeks, none confirmed, have said that two or more Americans have been taken to Iran. They were among many reports over several months about the fate or physical condition of Western hostages.

Anglican Church negotiator Terry Waite also is missing, and a Reuters report late Tuesday quoted Britain’s Independent Television Network as saying that Waite had been moved as well. The report cited a Shia Muslim source as saying that Waite had been mentally and physically harmed during his detention but was in good shape when he was taken to Iran.

The two Americans were reportedly taken from Lebanon to the Iranian Embassy in Damascus, Syria, late in May in coffins that purportedly contained the bodies of “Revolutionary Guard martyrs killed in action against Israel.”

The coffins went from the Bekaa Valley to Damascus in a Revolutionary Guard vehicle on a military road, the source said, and “an Iranian Embassy car with a diplomatic license plate transported them from Damascus to Iran via Turkey.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati, asked Tuesday in Vienna about reports that U.S. hostages had been taken to his country, replied, “We categorically deny them.”

In Washington, White House national security adviser Frank C. Carlucci said: “I really don’t want to comment on the movement of hostages. That’s a very sensitive issue. I’ve seen these reports, and I think there is some reason to question them.”