Word: french
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...only one target of Khomeini's wrath. Iran has been locked in a face-off with France since the two nations broke off relations last month. The French aircraft carrier Clemenceau last week steamed to the gulf as Iranian police continued to hold 15 French citizens hostage in the French embassy in Tehran. Tensions remained high between Iran and Britain over earlier incidents involving their diplomats. After the Mecca tragedy, gangs ransacked the Kuwaiti and Saudi Arabian embassies in the Iranian capital and took four Saudis prisoner...
...Anglican Envoy Terry Waite, who are missing in Lebanon. As the Iran-contra hearings showed, Reagan's arms sales to Iran were designed primarily to pry Americans from Hizballah's grasp. The deals apparently did secure the release of three Americans -- though four more were subsequently kidnaped -- just as French contacts with Iran appeared to win freedom for five Frenchmen last year...
...exploits are not confined to kidnaping. With the probable aid of 2,000 Revolutionary Guards stationed in the Bekaa Valley and 400 in southern Lebanon, the Islamic Jihad has claimed responsibility for six suicide attacks between 1982 and 1984 that took more than 500 lives and helped drive American, French and Israeli troops out of Lebanon. The campaign included the 1983 truck bombing that killed 241 U.S. servicemen billeted in Beirut...
Other countries have reason to fear that Hizballah will carry out terrorist acts on behalf of Iran. Last month a suspected member of Hizballah commandeered an Air Afrique jet, singled out a French passenger and shot him dead. Though the hijacking was staged ostensibly to force West Germany to release two jailed Hizballah operatives, the killing of the Frenchman suggested another motive: to pressure Paris to end the continuing diplomatic standoff between France and Iran. Washington last week quietly warned government installations at home and abroad to be alert to the Iranian threat. In West Berlin, the Allied Command ordered...
Tehran and Paris have been at daggers' points since mid-July, when France tried to question Wahid Gordji, an Iranian embassy translator. French police suspect that Gordji, who took refuge in the embassy, is linked to a string of Paris bombings last fall. When French officers surrounded the Iranian embassy to prevent Gordji's escape, Iran sealed off the French embassy in Tehran...