Missing Ex-FBI Agent in Hostage Video: ‘Help Me’
- Posted on December 9, 2011 at 7:16am by
Jonathon M. Seidl
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WASHINGTON (AP) — The family of retired FBI agent Robert Levinson, who vanished years ago in Iran, issued a plea to his kidnappers Friday and, for the first time, released a hostage video they received from his unidentified captors.
The video message released on the Levinson family’s website publicly transformed the mysterious disappearance into an international hostage standoff. Despite a lengthy investigation, however, the U.S. government has no evidence of who is holding the 63-year-old father of seven.
“Please tell us your demands so we can work together to bring my father home safely,” says Levinson’s son David, seated beside his mother, Christine.
The video plea represents a sharp change in strategy in a case that, for years, the United States treated as a diplomatic issue rather than a hostage situation. Christine Levinson, who lives in Coral Springs, Fla., has issued many public statements over the years, but she typically directed them to her missing husband or to the government of Iran.
In the hostage video, which the family received in November 2010, Levinson pleaded with the U.S. government to meet the demands of the people holding him, whom he did not identify.
The 54-second hostage video showed Levinson looking haggard but unharmed, sitting in front of what appeared to be a concrete wall. He had lost considerable weight, particularly in his face, and his white shirt hung off him. There were no signs of recent mistreatment. But Levinson, who has a history of diabetes and high blood pressure, implored the U.S. to help him quickly.
“I have been treated well. But I need the help of the United States government to answer the requests of the group that has held me for three and a half years,” Levinson says. “And please help me get home.”
His voice weakens and breaks as he speaks of “my beautiful, my loving, my loyal wife, Christine,” as well as his children and his grandson.
“I am not in very good health,” he says. “I am running very quickly out of diabetes medicine.”
The Associated Press saw the video soon after it arrived last year but did not immediately report it because the U.S. government said doing so would complicate diplomatic efforts to bring Levinson home.
Now, those efforts appear to have stalled, U.S. relations with Iran have worsened and Levinson’s family has stepped out of diplomatic channels to appeal directly to the kidnappers.
“We are not part of any government and we are not experts on the region,” David Levinson says. “No one can help us but you. Please help us.”
In the nearly five years that Levinson has been missing, the U.S. government has never had solid intelligence about what happened to him. Levinson had been retired from the FBI for years and was working as a private investigator when he traveled to the Iran in March 2007. His family has said an investigation into cigarette smuggling brought him to Kish, a resort island where Americans need no visa to visit.
The prevailing U.S. government theory had been that Levinson was arrested by Iranian intelligence officials to be interrogated and used as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Washington. But as every lead fizzled and Iran repeatedly denied any involvement in his disappearance, many in the U.S. government believed Levinson was probably dead.
The surprise arrival of the video, followed by a series of photographs, quickly changed that view. But they did little to settle the question of his whereabouts. The video, in fact, contained tantalizing clues suggesting Levinson was not being held in Iran at all, but rather in Pakistan, hundreds of miles from where he disappeared. The photographs, which arrived a few months after the video, contained hints that Levinson might be in Afghanistan, according to several U.S. officials, who insisted on anonymity to discuss the sensitive case.
The video prompted Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to announce publicly in March that Levinson was alive and urged the Iranians to help find him. Though the legacy of the 1979 hostage standoff with Iran looms over all relations between the two countries, Clinton did not refer to Levinson as a hostage in March and she softened the U.S. rhetoric toward Tehran.
The video also helped initiate a series of discreet discussions between U.S. and Iranian officials, conversations that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in September were producing good results.
Not long after Clinton’s remarks, the Levinson family received a series of photos of Levinson dressed in an orange prison jumpsuit like the ones worn by detainees at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. In these photos, Levinson’s hair and beard were much longer and he looked thinner.
In each photo, he wore a different sign hung around his neck. One read, “Why you can not help me.”
Investigators determined that the video was routed through an Internet address in Pakistan, suggesting that Levinson might be held there. Also, Pashtun wedding music played faintly in the background, officials said. The Pashtun people live primarily in Pakistan and Afghanistan, just over Iran’s eastern border.
The photos, however, traced back to a different Internet address, this one in Afghanistan.
Authorities don’t know whether those clues mean Levinson was being held in Balochistan – a rugged, arid region that spans parts of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan – or perhaps in the lawless tribal region along the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan. These areas are home to terrorists, militant groups and criminal organizations.
None of these groups has a clear motive for picking up Levinson. But an American hostage, particularly one who used to work for the U.S. government, would be considered a valuable commodity to any of them.
Over the past year, the hopefulness that initially followed the arrival of the video has faded. The meetings with the Iranians have not provided a breakthrough and U.S. officials said the government was no longer as optimistic about the future of those talks.
“We don’t know what else to do,” David Levinson says in the video released Friday. “Please tell us what you want.”
Some U.S. officials believe the Iranian government routed the video through Pakistan as a way to blame Levinson’s disappearance on someone else – most likely the anti-Iran terrorist group Jundallah. But as with every other possibility, the U.S. has no proof.
The video was accompanied by a demand that the U.S. release prisoners, but officials said the United States is not holding anyone matching the names on the list. It’s possible some of them may have been held by the Pakistani government at one point, but officials say the demand doesn‘t offer any indication of who might be holding Levinson and there’s been no more communication about it.
U.S. authorities have repeatedly analyzed the video and the apparently scripted remarks Levinson made, looking for clues.
For instance, Levinson said a “group” had held him for three and a half years, a word choice that could suggest a criminal organization or terrorist group, rather than a government. And he said he had been held “here” for that time, suggesting he had not been moved.
Levinson’s dire warning about his diabetes medication is perplexing. He vanished years ago. Whoever is holding him must have had access to diabetes medicine at one point. Was he running out of medication because he was moved somewhere else? Or was it simply intended to add even more urgency for the U.S.?
Relations with Iran, meanwhile, have worsened. The Justice Department recently accused Iranian intelligence agents of plotting to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador in Washington. Then a United Nations watchdog released a report warning of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, prompting the United States and its Western allies to issue new sanctions against Iran’s financial system.
Most recently, a high-tech, stealth CIA drone was captured by Iranian officials while on a surveillance mission over Iran. The embarrassing mishap put sophisticated technology in Iranian hands and provided public evidence of the kind of spying that’s been long suspected.
The one bright spot in Washington’s relationship with Tehran was the release of two American hikers from an Iranian prison in September. The U.S. worked behind the scenes to secure that release but officials said Levinson was not part of those discussions.
“All I want is for our family to be whole again,” Christine Levinson said in the video, in a message directed toward her husband. “We love you. We miss you every day. We will not abandon you.”
—
Associated Press writer Matthew Lee contributed to this report.
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snufy
Posted on December 10, 2011 at 10:38pmSGTB, you’re a delusional fool, along with your other dummies that think we don’t need intelligence on the enemy. If you people read the article, it says that he was not in Iranian territory, therefore not needing an Iranian visa. You are also confused about the role of the FBI. There is more that one intelligence agency in this country. Mr Levinson was not an intelligence operative before he retired.
Report Post »BOMUSTGO, how did you go from reading that he was retired from the FBI to saying he is with the CIA? I wonder about the intelligence, or lack thereof, displayed in these comments.
the point
Posted on December 10, 2011 at 9:49amGod bless and be with this man. If he were a Dem , Obama would get him out in a Chicago minute
Report Post »just so he could get his vote.
thegreatcarnac
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 3:22pmIf Bush was president now the media would be screaming for this guy’s release because his capture would embarrass the administration. Since we have a little socialist/democrat in office named obama…the media has hidden the fact this man is even held by anyone.
Report Post »Tepeyac
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:14pmWhat is an Ex, cia agent doing going any where near Iran. Just like the young hikers (?) That was *********! I would carry on a dialogue about their release but would go no further!
Report Post »Nicoal
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:11pmPutting this on my Facebook account right now, knowing the only way to do something about this is to act right away. Our administration will do nothing unless and until there is public outrage. Call and write congress as well as Hillary Clinton on behalf of the Levinson family.
Report Post »abbygirl1994
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 1:09pmI tell you why they aren’t trying to get this man released.. because he’s old.. and this administration doesn’t give a squat about the old.. what they care about is brainwashing the young.. Yo, Washington.. will SOMEONE please HELP this family and get Mr. Levinson home to them.. Is there anyone in the damn GOP who cares… SOMEONE PLEASE HELP!
Report Post »Free2speakRN
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:07pmWhat you say rings true.
Report Post »Thevoice
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 10:24amO and the drone….First what idiot would not put a self destruct switch in a unmanned vehicle flying over Iran ..Second now that it will be reversed engineered do we need the TSA and homeland security. I mean hell in a couple months they can just hit us unmanned . Guess when it what went missing we didn’t have the balls to go over the mean old neighbors fence and get our ball back.
Report Post »ChiefGeorge
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 11:10amRoll out the hostages now that War with Iran is imminent! Have not heard from this guy for years and now all of a sudden the vid.
Report Post »hud
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 12:31pmA missile from another drone should have blown the downed one to small pieces of matter.
Report Post »abbygirl1994
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 1:17pmI do not believe that the drone crashed.. I believe this country gave it to Iran!! If it had been shot down it would have been damaged.. if it had crashed it would have been damaged.. the drone had little if any damage! God help us! This inept President has brought this country to some of the greatest dangers this country has ever seen.. even the revolutionary war was nothing compared to the mass destruction that the weapons there is now!
Report Post »moreteaplease
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 10:20amThe Associated Press saw the video soon after it arrived last year but did not immediately report it because the U.S. government said doing so would complicate diplomatic efforts to bring Levinson home.
Report Post »************************************************
Sorry, I’m not buying that.
southernORcobra
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 3:16pmyeah me either because they are more than happy to parade around images of dead US soldiers.
Report Post »Thevoice
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 10:13amTo the mentally challenged this again is a perfect example..along with the other 12 or so CIA people held captive…..The Mooselambs are not your friend…You can’t go hiking in their mountains or go looking for cigarette smuggling there or get to close, unannounced to nuclear facilities . Without being thrown into prison. Rather they are like mad rabbi dogs better to be put to death . And in their case another kill them with kindness or negotiating give away is ridiculous. In the case of the hikers…We were never told what was given to them for their release…No keep that under raps.. The idiots we have in gooberment today ..Listen up …Send a message tell them they got 2 hours to put all the captured infidels on a plane and out of there., Or their going to have a off the record Tomahawk hail storm at the time of your choosing…If they don’t listen put one right up the Iranians sandman ass when he is doing his morning carpet crapping…And stop acting like it’s all so complecated …Its not you idiots.
Report Post »Hickory
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 9:30amHe is just an expendable commodity in the Obama world.
Report Post »SgtB
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 10:55amI consider 99% of FBI agents expendable. They are the one violating our Constitution on a daily basis and when they go on “intelligence gathering missions” they are constantly in violation of our treaties and risk harm to our foreign relations creating the increased probability of war. Just like the other day, why did we have a drone flying over Iran? (I know that the drone in the Iranian video is just a mockup but we did lose a drone there) Who is making these orders? Who really gives a flying rat’s @55 if Iran ( a sovereign nation) gets a nuclear weapon? Most people here say that the threat of mutually assured destruction will not work against them. But here’s the catch, it doesn’t have to. All we have to do is bring our troops home and cut spending while directing small amounts of money to the right national defense research operations like laser based missile interdiction systems that could act as a shield over our entire nation and if we ever shoot down an Iranian nuclear warhead we can send them a kinetic missile from space that cannot be shot down and take out their seat of gov’t. We don’t need to keep them from getting anything.
Report Post »BOMUSTGO
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:42amIn light of this and the stealth spy drone, these Muslim animals will see this as a sign from allah and make an example of him.Just saying.
Report Post »BOMUSTGO
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:46amA CIA agent should know the risks involved when spying.
Report Post »progressiveslayer
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:38amLevinson, you want this regime to help you? Sorry, with that last name I‘m afraid you’re on your own.
Report Post »blue_sky
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:13amMay be if we do not invade their air space with drones, Iranian would be less eager to get N bomb.
Report Post »Stoic one
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 9:54amIran’s stated goal for a NUCLEAR bomb is the destruction of Israel; therefore the drones are irrelevant.
Report Post »ebaytoad
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:11amGet this man out !!! what is wrong with all you useless idiots in Washington!! Hillary get off your ass and do something!!
Report Post »blue_sky
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:22amYou can donate your money and send your children to fight Iran, but keep your dirty fingers from taxpayers money. The Levinson family should explain how he got Iranian visa to enter and business did he do there.
Report Post »Snowleopard {gallery of cat folks}
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 8:02amGod above for the sake of him and his family let him come home hale and whole.
Report Post »NOBALONEY
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 7:44amNot to worry. Obama administration and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the creation of the “Virtual Embassy” in Tehran, Iran.
Report Post »