U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said that the United States has received tips that ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson, reported missing in Iran nearly four years ago, is alive in captivity in southwest Asia.
Clinton said in a statement that the U.S. has "received recent indications that Bob is being held somewhere in southwest Asia."
She urged the Iranian "to undertake humanitarian efforts to safely return and reunite Bob with his family."
Levinson's wife
appealed to Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad for her husband's release nearly a year ago.
An Iranian lawyer for the family said in an April 2009
interview that he thought Levinson was being held in Iran.
compiled from agency reports