Iran Searches U.S. Freighter Outside Gulf

WASHINGTON —  For the first time in the history of Iran’s five-year war with Iraq, an Iranian patrol boat on Sunday stopped an American merchant ship in international waters outside the Persian Gulf, searched it for military contraband, then released it without reported harm to ship or crew.

White House spokesman Peter Roussel called the halting of the 22,000-ton bulk cargo ship President Taylor “a matter of serious concern” to President Reagan. He withheld further comment pending debriefing of the crew at Fujaira, a port in the United Arab Emirates on the Gulf of Oman.

According to Steve Potash, a spokesman for the Oakland-based American President Lines steamship company, the President Taylor was in the Gulf of Oman about 30 miles south of Fujaira, its immediate destination, late Sunday morning when it radioed company officials that it had been stopped for boarding by an Iranian naval vessel.

The boarding party, consisting of seven crewmen headed by an officer from “a ship of the Iranian navy” that was not otherwise described, searched the Taylor for two hours, then allowed it to proceed, State Department spokesman Bruce Ammerman reported.

Over the last five months, Ammerman said, the Iranian navy has searched vessels of several neutral nations in an effort to uncover military stores bound for Iraq, but “this is the first time an American-flag vessel has been stopped.”

“Although this incident is of obvious concern to us,” Ammerman said, “we have not yet met with the ship’s captain to determine the full facts.”

Asked about the legality of the Iranian action, Ammerman said it will be impossible to judge until the facts are known.

Ammerman said the ship’s crew of about 45 and its captain, identified by Potash as Robert Reimann, would be questioned by the staff of the U.S. Embassy at Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates.

A possible explanation for the Iranians’ relatively brief delay of the Taylor came from Potash, who said the vessel was carrying “virtually no cargo” when it was stopped. He said it had left Karachi, Pakistan, for Fujaira to pick up a cargo of relief supplies destined for CARE and Catholic welfare agencies in India.