At the moment, and he went missing FBI agent Robert Levinson retired to Iran in the case of the so-called cold.
After nearly four years without word on what happened to Levinson, his family received late last year, evidence that the father of seven alive. The dramatic development that has escalated to a large extent diplomatic efforts to take him home.
Until then, never any evidence as to whether Levinson was alive or dead, because it disappeared in March 2007 on the island of Kish in Iran. Mystery still surrounds the World Health Organization or is holding Levinson, but the evidence that is assesses a glimmer of hope that anyone who is willing to negotiate his release.
“It’s almost four years ago I saw a beloved husband, Robert Levinson,” his wife, Christine, said in a statement posted on the website of the family. “It is very encouraging news of our family of Bob alive, but remains concerned for his safety and well-being.”
Known as the Associated Press reported evidence that Levinson living since shortly after his arrival reporting, but was delayed, and officials said all the publicity gets Levinson would threaten the home safely. The AP does not reveal the nature of the evidence, because officials believe it would hurt efforts for his release.
On Thursday, Foreign Ministry issued a statement three wholesale and Hillary Clinton’s Foreign Minister said there were indications that Levinson was in the South-West Asia and asks Iran for help. I learned the Associated Press more details and after a lengthy investigation into the disappearance of Levinson and try to get him back to the United States
Authorities do not know why he was now living proof that Levinson has emerged after years of silence. But I felt the most hope for a diplomatic tour, since his disappearance.
Iran has repeatedly said that the diplomats No information about Levinson, but the United States, investigators said they believe he was taken from long before Iranian government agents. The United States announced Thursday a sudden change in the tone of what has come to the discussions. The United States has already expressed deep frustration with what he said was Iran’s failure to cooperate.
Over the years, and many thought the United States Government that was 62 years with diabetes, high blood pressure of the deceased. As evidence that he is alive, and this issue is one of the most international hostage situations involve citizens in the United States. Levinson unusual, but since no one has publicly admitted to holding him.
“It is encouraging that we have good news,” said Senator Bill Nelson of Florida. “I can pray for it to be returned to his family.”
He told Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s careful about what is known about his country Levinson. During one interview he said he had no information, and offered to help and accused the FBI of withholding information about why Levinson was in Iran.
Left Levinson FBI in 1998, and became a private investigator. He said he had discussed the smuggling of cigarettes in the early 2007, and his family and said that the work took him to Iran. Kish, a resort area and a hotbed of smuggling and organized crime. It is also a free trade zone, which means that American citizens do not need visas to travel there.
Iran, the country’s borders from the South-West Asia, Pakistan and Afghanistan, raising the possibility that Levinson, who was traveling in one of those countries. It is known that both crossings, smuggling routes. It would be the way to Pakistan to lead the tribal region, which includes rebels and terrorist groups and criminal organizations.
Levinson, disappeared after a meeting with Salah el-Din Dawoud, a U.S. fugitive wanted for killing a former Iranian diplomat in Maryland in 1980. Salahuddin said he saw another Levinson interrogated by Iranian officials. The use of the signature Levinson special check of the hotel, but did not get to the airport.
Over the years, the stories flowed in the witnesses who claim evidence for a place to Levinson, they have. But like a lot about Iran, the United States was never able to verify these accounts.
Said one Iranian dissidents who now live in the United States, Reza Kahlili, The Associated Press that Levinson was picked up by the Quds Force, a unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. The Kahlili Levinson said he was told from sources inside Iran, and money laundering in the investigation and discovered a link between the Russian mafia and the Revolutionary Guards.
Said Levinson Kahlili transfer to a safe house in Tehran, but he does not know what happened to him. An official in the former Federal Bureau of Investigation, the United States had been aware of this account, and although described Kahlili reliable, the United States could not confirm his story.
In 2009, the Iranian dissident, said that the U.S. authorities, said that while jailed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and saw the name “Levinson to” books on the window of his cell door. This account is contained in a diplomatic note obtained by the site Wikileaks published last month. Former officials have expressed doubts about the defector, however, when the Associated Press it is in Europe in early January, said he had not seen the name Levinson.
Repeatedly called for the U.S. State Department on Iran to provide more information about Levinson. The U.S. diplomats also asked foreign leaders to intervene. Founded and even the Vatican, but in 2008 the Iranian government criticized the pope’s ambassador to Tehran, said the Vatican had no work asking about the case, according to documents of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In 2009, Clinton ordered a new diplomatic pressure. In a UN conference in The Hague in that year, she personally sent a letter to Iranian officials, urging them to request assistance for Levinson.