LONDON -- A British newspaper says that Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps orchestrated the 2007 kidnapping of five Britons in Iraq and took them to Iran within a day of their abduction.
An unnamed former Revolutionary Guard told "The Guardian" newspaper that computer expert Peter Moore and his four bodyguards were seized by the elite Al-Quds brigade of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and taken "deep inside Iran."
An unnamed former Iraqi intelligence chief also told the paper that the kidnapped men were "hooded and handcuffed" as they were taken in cars from Baghdad to the Iranian border.
The British Foreign Office said it has no evidence to back up the claims.
On December 30, Moore was
released unharmed. Three of his kidnapped bodyguards are confirmed dead.
Moore was working to install software at the Iraqi Finance Ministry meant to track down billions of dollars in international aid and oil revenues, some of which had gone missing.
His release coincided with the transfer of Qais al-Khazali, the head of the militant group Asaib Ahl al-Haq, or League of the Righteous, from U.S. to Iraqi custody.
The League of the Righteous has been held responsible for the kidnapping of Moore and his bodyguards but was thought to have links with Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps.
compiled from agency reports