Qatar rejects Iran's account of three captured pilots

General Mohammad Bagherzadeh of Iran's armed forces wrote to the International Committee of the Red Cross that three pilots, Javad Salehi, Abdolmajid Dashtian and Omran Behraveshian, were captured alive by Qatar after their Su-24 aircraft crashed in March, and said they had been held incommunicado for six months, with no access to their families or to diplomats, according to the Fars news agency. Qatar's foreign ministry replied on Saturday through spokesman Majed al-Ansari that it categorically denies the claims that Iranian pilots are being detained and is surprised by misleading statements at a time when diplomatic efforts to de-escalate are under way. Iran had previously said one pilot was killed and the others were missing.

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