WORLD IN BRIEF : LEBANON : Third Anniversary for Hostage Waite

Anglican envoy Terry Waite begins today his fourth year as a hostage of pro-Iranian Shiite Muslim militants with his fate, and those of other captives, apparently hinging on a power struggle in Tehran. A reliable Shiite source, who is familiar with the thinking of the hostage-holding factions, said the issue of the 18 Westerners missing in Lebanon is “on the back burner” until Iran’s political infighting is settled. Waite, 50, disappeared in Muslim West Beirut on Jan. 20, 1987. He was last seen leaving his seaside hotel to keep a rendezvous with kidnapers holding two Americans--journalist Terry Anderson and Scottish-born educator Thomas Sutherland--to negotiate their release.