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Diplomatic Wrangling

Iran Wants Germany to Swap Assassin for Jailed Tourist

A German tourist who has been held in an Iranian jail for over a year because his fishing boat accidentally entered a restricted zone in the Persian Gulf has become a bargaining chip of international dipomacy. Iran wants to swap him for a convicted assassin serving a life sentence in a German jail.

Iran wants Germany to release a convicted killer in return for a German tourist who was jailed after his boat strayed into Iranian territorial waters by mistake.

Iranian officials have responded to German appeals for his release by linking the case to that of Kazem Darabi, who is serving a life sentence in Germany for the 1992 assassination of four Iranian-Kurdish opposition leaders in a Berlin restaurant. The court that convicted Darabi in 1997 said the orders for the killings came from the highest state levels in Tehran.

The tourist, Donald Klein, 53, from Lambsheim in southwestern Germany, was jailed for 18 months by an Iranian court for illegally crossing a border. The sculptor, a passionate angler, had been on vacation in Dubai in November 2005 and had hired a boat to catch swordfish and parrot fish in the Persian Gulf.

His French skipper steered the vessel into the Strait of Ormuz and close to the island of Abu Mussa, a restricted zone. They were arrested, interrogated and sentenced within weeks.

Klein's wife Karin has made numerous appeals for clemency to Iranian officials. When his mother died, she sent them a copy of the death certificate, hoping the mullahs would show compassion. There was no response.

Klein has lost a lot of weight -- 32 kilograms -- while in jail, where he has shared a cell with 13 other inmates, and at least for a while suffered depression. He has become a political football and his fate is "an indicator of German-Iranian relations," says Rolf Mützenich, a member of parliament tasked with mediating to get him freed.

In her frustration Karin accused the German government of not doing enough to help him, but in truth it has been actively trying to secure his release. Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier wrote to his Iranian counterpart Manouchehr Mottaki, summoned Iran's Berlin ambassador to his ministry and asked former foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati, now an adviser to Iran's spiritual leader Ali Khameini, to mediate.

Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, his state secretary August Hanning and German members of parliament have been bringing up Klein's case whenever they have held talks with Iranian officials.

Appeal by German President

Shortly before Christmas 2006 President Horst Köhler sent a letter to Khameini asking for Klein's early release as a sign of mercy.

The Iranians, after months of silence, are now starting to link the name Klein with that of Darabi. After initial hints, Iranian officials mentioned Darabi quite openly in recent talks with German diplomats. The German government now knows that it could get Klein back immediately.

But would such an exchange be a justifiable act of government policy? Can an angler who cast his bait in the wrong place and faces only another four months in jail be swapped for a state terrorist who's serving a life sentence? After all, Darabi could be a valuable asset for German diplomats. They could dangle him to kick-start stalled talks about a prisoner exchange between Iranian-backed Hezbollah and Israel.

Besides, the German government doesn't want to set a precedent and be seen as vulnerable to blackmail. So it's decided to do all it can to help Klein while avoiding to link his fate with that of Darabi.

That's why the German Foreign Ministry sent Mützenich, a member of parliament for the center-left Social Democrats, to hold talks in Tehran. He's a board member of the German-Iranian society and spent three days in December discussing Klein's case with Iran's Science Minister and with fellow parliamentarians. "Anything other than an early release of Klein would put a burden on relations between Tehran and Berlin," he said.

The situation remains difficult to gauge because it's unclear what faction will prevail in Tehran, the hardliners or the moderates, said Mützenich. However, he said it was an "important signal" that he was allowed to spend two hours talking to Klein.

The Germans don't know how to interpret the fact that Klein's living conditions in jail are now exceptionally good, and positively luxurious by Iranian standards. He can phone his wife as often as he likes.

Berlin is now hoping that Köhler's letter may prompt Tehran to release Klein for the February 11 anniversary of the Iranian revolution, a day on which the government has in the past granted amnesties.

But there's an alternative and sinister scenario too: That the Iranian government may decide to charge Klein with spying, an absurd accusation but one that would help the Iranians press for a Darabi deal. The possibility of such a charge is "hanging over the case like the sword of Damocles," say worried officials in Berlin.

Reporting by Jürgen Dahlkamp and Holger Stark