**The Foreign Office says it is “actively investigating” reports that five British yachtsmen held by the Iranian navy for a week have been freed.**The crew were said to have mistakenly strayed into Iran waters as they sailed from Bahrain to Dubai for a race.
It comes hours after UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband spoke by phone to his Iranian counterpart.
Iranian state radio said the five were released at 0400 GMT. It is thought the five were held on the island of Siri.
Luke Porter, 21, from Weston-super-Mare; Oliver Smith, 31, from Southampton; Oliver Young, 21, from Cornwall; Sam Usher, 26, from Scarborough, and Bahrain-based David Bloomer were held on 25 November.
‘Actively investigating’
According to reports in Iran, the naval guard command of Siri island announced the five were freed and accepted the yacht entered Iranian waters “by mistake”.
BBC correspondent Christian Fraser in Bahrain said he had spoken to Vanessa Bloomer, Mr Bloomer’s wife, who said she had received no independent verification of the men’s release.
Our correspondent added there was still a lot of uncertainty about what was going on.
The five were detained after the Iranian navy stopped their Volvo 60 yacht in the Gulf on 25 November.
Families of the five men had been due to meet with Foreign Office officials later.
The Team Pindar-backed yacht was sailing from Bahrain to Dubai to take part in the Dubai-Muscat Offshore Race.
The 360-nautical mile Dubai-Muscat Offshore Sailing Race began on 26 November and ended two days later in the Omani capital’s Bandar Al-Rawdah marina.
YACHT CREW
- Oliver Smith, 31, an engineer from Southampton, yacht’s skipper
- Oliver Young, 21, professional yachtsman from Cornwall
- Luke Porter, 21, professional sailor from Weston-Super-Mare
- David Bloomer, radio presenter based in Bahrain
- Sam Usher, 26, owns sailing academy in Scarborough
Race organisers said the five may have been “drifting” as a result of propeller problems.
The Kingdom of Bahrain yacht is owned by the Sail Bahrain project, which aims to promote the island as a yachting destination and was recently launched by Team Pindar.
Team Pindar is owned by G A Pindar & Son Ltd, a family-owned print and publishing business based in Scarborough, North Yorkshire.
It is not the first time British sailors have been detained after being accused of straying into Iranian waters.
In March 2007 there was a prolonged stand-off between the UK and Iran after a 15-strong Royal Navy crew was detained by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
And in 2004, eight British servicemen were held in Iran after being seized in the Shatt al-Arab waterway, where they were training the Iraqi river patrol service.
IRAN’S MARITIME CLAIMS
In 1993 Iran informed the UN of its claims over a territorial sea, a contiguous zone and an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) extending to the continental shelf.
- Territorial sea: Iran claims sovereignty over a belt of sea, measured 12 nautical miles from its baseline. This extends to the air space above it as well as to its bed and subsoil
- **Contiguous zone: ** An area adjacent to the territorial sea with an outer limit of 24 nautical miles from the baseline. The Iranian government claims the right to take steps to prevent the infringement of laws and regulations
- EEZ and the continental shelf boundary: Within the EEZ, which extends out to the continental shelf line, Iran claims exclusive rights to all natural resources, research and the building of structures.
Source: Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, US Department of State
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