Wed, 02 Dec 2009 5:59p.m.
Crabtree’s fellow crew members have been in Iranian custody for a week now
By Jeff Hampton
A Queenstown man is lucky to be at liberty after his racing yacht ‘Kingdom of Bahrain’ was seized with its five British crew, for straying into Iranian waters in the Persian Gulf.
Nick Crabtree had stayed in Bahrain as the vessel sailed to Dubai to prepare for a race.
On the way it broke a propeller, and ended up drifting near an Iranian island where missiles are stored.
Crabtree’s fellow crew members have been in Iranian custody for a week now.
He was to have skippered the boat in a race off Dubai. He is safe in Bahrain, but also runs a tourist yachting venture in Queenstown. His wife and staff would not go on camera, saying the British Foreign Office had asked them not to talk.
The vessel is the centre of a major international incident – Iran says it is checking if the crew had “evil intentions”, Britain says the yacht strayed because its propeller broke.
“It’s got nothing to do with politics, it has nothing to do with nuclear enrichment programmes – this is a consular case,” says British Foreign Secretary David Miliband.
The yacht had five abroad – the oldest was David Bloomer, a radio presenter due to broadcast the race.
Skipper Olly Smith is 31 years old, and the rest of the crew are in their 20s.
“We are tremendously concerned, we want to try and do anything we can to help Luke’s situation, but it is difficult,” says Charles Porter, a father of one of the crew members.
The incident has come at a time when Britain and Iran’s President Mahmoud Admadinejad are at loggerheads over its nuclear power plants.
“The British Government has itself accepted these sailors entered Iranian waters – whether it was on purpose or inadvertently, it will be the subject of further investigations,” says Iranian parliamentarian Heshmatoolah Falahatpisheh.
The crew’s supporters believe it is a simple mistake.
“They weren’t able to motor, or sail because of the lack of wind – they were effectively a raft on the ocean,” says professional yachtsman Alex Bennet. “It’s easy to understand how they may have drifted with the currents of the ocean into Iranian territorial waters.”
That has cost more than just a place in a race – the yacht and crew are now the centre of an international stand-off.
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