Ali Pahlavan: "I Am Very Worried..."

The executive editor of Tehran's Iran News spoke with the BBC about the dangers to world peace in Britain's current hostage crisis:

My understanding of the situation is that this could be a reaction to the UN sanctions which were passed two days ago... the revolutionary guards had promised that some sort of reaction would be forthcoming from Iran.

The revolutionary guards are a very hard line, ultra-conservative wing of the regime who believe that the US and Britain need to be challenged in the Persian Gulf and in the Middle East... their interests need to be challenged in Palestine, in Lebanon, in Iraq and elsewhere.

So this could be part of the strategy to challenge the British and American supremacy in this part of the world which is troubling. It could lead to confrontation and be a trigger and which could lead to escalation...

... I am worried because it's very different than the 2004 incident. The revolutionary guard is the government now.

So it is troubling and it is worrying. Many of us analysts had predicted an incident in the Persian Gulf, which is very crucial to the global economy and to Western interests and could trigger something disastrous.