2nd American to Be Freed, Beirut Messages Declare

An American educator held hostage in Beirut, Frank H. Reed, will be freed within 48 hours, according to statements delivered to news offices in the Lebanese capital Sunday evening.

The statements were accompanied by photos of Reed, a native of Malden, Mass., the first hard evidence of him since his kidnaping on Sept. 9, 1986.

The pledge to free the 57-year-old school official came one week after pro-Iranian kidnapers in Beirut released Robert Polhill, a college professor who had been held captive for 39 months. Polhill, 55, was the first American hostage to be released in 3 1/2 years.

An initial communique on Reed, delivered to an international news agency and the Lebanese newspaper An Nahar, was unsigned. But a second message, dropped at the newspaper three hours later, identified the kidnapers under the name Islamic Dawn, which has never before surfaced in the long-running hostage crisis.

But an article in today’s Tehran Times appeared to place Reed’s abductors among the 100 or more pro-Iranian extremists whom Western intelligence services hold responsible for the majority of the Beirut kidnapings.

As monitored by Associated Press in Nicosia, the article quoted an unidentified Iranian official as saying that “extensive talks” took place after the release of Polhill, apparently between Iranian authorities and the kidnapers.

“We asked them to release a second hostage unconditionally and on humanitarian and Islamic grounds to once again display their goodwill,” the official told the Tehran Times.

“We do believe that with the fulfillment of this promise, the Lebanese Muslim groups have displayed maximum goodwill. The ball is now in the other party’s court to reciprocate,” the article said, in an apparent reference to the United States or other Western nations whose citizens have been held hostage in Beirut.

In the United States, President Bush was asked about the report while playing golf at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington. He told journalists: “I just won’t say anything. If that proves to be true, that’s wonderful.”

A State Department spokesman said: “We remain hopeful; we hope this report is true, and we continue to urge the release of all the hostages.” But he said Washington has had no contact with the kidnapers.

Earlier Sunday, Sen. David L. Boren (D-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he is “very optimistic that we’re going to see more hostages released.”

Interviewed on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Boren said his optimism stems in part from the fact that both Iran and Syria, which are believed to have influence on the kidnapers, are experiencing economic problems and need stronger ties with the West.

After Polhill’s release April 22, statements by Lebanese militants and Arab press reports speculated that a second American hostage would soon be freed, but by the middle of last week, remarks from the same sources left the momentum of the breakthrough on the hostages in doubt.

Typewritten in Arabic, Sunday’s initial statement on Reed said:

“In the name of God the merciful, the compassionate, we have decided to free American hostage Frank Reed within 48 hours. He will carry a message addressed to the American Administration.”

No conditions were set, and there was no further information immediately available in Beirut.

According to press reports from the Lebanese capital, each of the copies was accompanied by a different photo of Reed, who was director of the Lebanese International School when he was abducted from his chauffeured car on the way to a golf club near the Beirut airport.

One photo, in color, showed him in a blue-and-white striped shirt and clean shaven. The other, in black and white, depicted a bearded face.

While the accompanying statement was not signed, the last previous communication on Reed--until Sunday there had been none since Sept. 14, 1986--said he was a captive of the Arab Revolutionary Cells-Omar Mukhtar Brigade.

The Arab Revolutionary Cells is one of many cover names for the terrorist organization run by Abu Nidal, a Palestinian believed to be operating out of Libya.

After news reports about the statement were broadcast, mentioning the Omar Mukhtar Brigade, a subsequent message was sent to An Nahar, with a third photo of Reed. That message read:

“We assert that the (first) statement we issued did not carry the signature of the Organization of Arab Revolutionary Cells-Omar Mukhtar Brigade. News agencies . . . should seek accuracy in news reporting. Otherwise they will be exposed to our persecution and stern punishment.

“We also stress our previous statement that we shall release American hostage Frank Reed with a message for the U.S. Administration. We hope the media will carry our statement fully without tampering.”

At the time of Reed’s kidnaping, the initial claim of responsibility came from a telephone caller saying he represented Islamic Jihad, a pro-Iranian faction of Lebanese Shiite Muslims. Islamic Jihad issued a statement disavowing any part in the kidnaping, and the subsequent claim was made in the name of the Omar Mukhtar Brigade, the mystery group whose only professed hostage is Reed.

The release of Polhill, five days after his kidnapers said he would be freed within 48 hours, signaled a break in the agonizing ordeal of the foreign hostages. The Bush Administration, while declaring it had made no deal for the release of the professor and would not negotiate with kidnapers for the freedom of others, applauded the Syrian government for its role.

Secretary of State James A. Baker III also said, “We thank Iran for these efforts, noting the Iranians have a responsibility to help secure the release of other hostages in Lebanon.”

The initial signs of movement on the deadlocked hostage crisis appeared earlier this year in the Tehran Times, a newspaper aligned with President Hashemi Rafsanjani, whose centrist administration supports improved relations with Western powers.

Polhill was held by a group calling itself Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine, and he told an American debriefing team in Wiesbaden, West Germany, that the only hostages he saw during his captivity were Jesse Turner and Alann Steen, fellow professors from Beirut University College who were abducted with him.

American counterintelligence officials say they believe that all the Beirut kidnap groups, which now hold seven Americans and several other Westerners, are closely related and may simply use different cover names.