Socialists urge hostage freedom

Iranian Foreign Minister Sadeq Ghotbzadeh said socialist leaders -- "without any exception" -- told him they could not support Iran unless the 53 American hostages were freed.

Speaking to reporters Monday on his talks with socialist leaders in Oslo and Stockholm last week, Mr. Ghotbzadeh said: "I talked to all socialist leaders collectively and individually. All of them without any exception -- both the socialists from the third world and socialists from Europe -- were unanimous in their view that this problem of the hostages must be solved somehow.

"All of them believed that continuation of this condition will rule out their defense of the Islamic revolution of Iran," he said.

Meanwhile, a source in Iran's Revolutionary Guard said some of the US hostages, in their 227th day of captivity as of today (June 17), are still be ing held at the US Embassay, contradicting statements that they have been split up and held in 15 provincial centers to discourage another American military attempt to free them.