Nourizadeh says Iran was probably hoping to win the release of five Iranian military men captured by U.S.forces in Kurdistan in 2005 in exchange for Saberi, but eventually realized that such a trade would not work.

VOA: standard.2009.05.06

Iraj Hassanzadeh, the deputy governor of Iran's Kurdistan province, told Fars the three were arrested in the western Iranian city of Marivan.

CNN: Hikers' friend says they crossed into Iran by mistake

Iran has shelled bases of the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan along the Iran and Iraq border, with the latest strikes coming on Monday in northern Iraq, according to a Kurdish regional government official in Iraq.

CNN: Iran, Turkey co-ordinate against Kurds

You write that its memory of the chemical weapons that Saddam used in both Iraqi Kurdistan and Iran are very much alive.

NPR: Saddam's Past with U.S. Has Implications for Iraq