US rules out freeing Iranians, rejects torture charge

WASHINGTON: The United States on Wednesday ruled out freeing five Iranians in US custody in Iraq and rejected Tehran's charge that it tortured another during a two-month captivity in the war-torn country.

Iran has warned it is unlikely to attend a May ministerial conference in Egypt on Iraq's security unless Washington releases the five, whom US authorities seized in a raid in northern Iraq in January.

Asked whether the United States was prepared to free them, White House national security spokesman Gordon Johndroe curtly replied: "No".

US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said there was "no reason in the world why they should not attend this conference if they truly had an interest in being supportive of Iraq, Iraqi people and the Iraqi government."

"It's not about the US and Iran, it's not about anything else other than Iraq," he said, telling reporters that the United States "would not recognize" any linkage between the fate of the five and Iran's presence at the talks.

McCormack said that an Iranian request for access to the five was "still being considered."

Johndroe also rejected charges from Iranian state television that the United States had severely abused an Iranian diplomat during a two-month captivity in Iraq, saying that the United States had nothing to do with his plight.

"The United States was not involved in his detention, and any suggestion of torture is baseless," Johndroe said after Iranian television showed footage of Jalal Sharafi's wounds and called them proof of US torture.