TEHRAN, 10 December 2003 — Iran took an uncompromising line against kidnappers holding one Irish and two German tourists in the unruly southeast of the country yesterday, saying no ransom would be paid to a gang it described as disgruntled drug smugglers. “We are making all efforts to recover the hostages in the shortest possible time and return them to their families,” Ali Asghar Ahmadi, deputy minister in charge of security, said in a statement faxed to AFP.

He said the incident was “a price that authorities have to pay in combating drug smugglers and drug trafficking”. “It is very important to us to solve this issue without giving in to blackmail and without showing any leniency,” the statement said, confirming a ransom of $6 million had been demanded by their captors.

Officials said the three tourists were cycling near Nosrat Abad, on the road between the ancient city of Bam and Zahedan in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan when they were kidnapped late last week by bandits. They said the ransom figure was equivalent to a recent drugs haul made by Iranian police in the area, leading them to suspect that angered smugglers were behind the abductions.

“Since the value of the seized consignment equaled the demand made by the kidnappers, the likelihood is that the kidnappers are trying this blackmail in order to retrieve their lost profits,” Ahmadi said.

“A special committee has been set up to follow up the case. We will take action and confront these people,” he added, asserting that “under no circumstances we will allow anyone in any province to jeopardize the lives of foreigners.” “These people are under the protection of the Islamic republic and we will defend their lives.”

The area where the kidnapping took place is near the border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, and is notorious as a corridor for the smuggling of heroin, opium and cannabis. Tourists are urged to take extra care in the area, and earlier yesterday Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi complained that the three — apparently on their way to Katmandu — “were cycling in the area without any coordination with the police.”

In Berlin, the German Foreign Ministry said it has set up a crisis group. “The government has learned about a kidnapping involving foreigners in Iran. We have information that there may be Germans,” the ministry spokeswoman said.