DOUBLE STANDARD

The Guardian accuses the US of escalating tensions with Iran because the White House is willing to entertain the possibility Iran's new president is a thug:

The White House yesterday ratcheted up tensions with Iran by saying that it was taking seriously claims by Americans who were held hostage in the 1979 Tehran embassy siege that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's president-elect, was one of their captors.

President George Bush said "many questions" had been raised by the allegations that Mr Ahmadinejad was one of the leaders of radical students who seized the embassy and held 52 hostages for more than year.

The claims were made yesterday by five former hostages who said the incoming Iranian president had been involved in interrogations during the embassy drama. "As soon as I saw his picture in the paper, I knew that was the bastard," Colonel Charles Scott, 73, told the Washington Times. "He was one of the top two or three leaders ... The new president of Iran is a terrorist."

On the other hand, the UN takes seriously rumours the US is holding terrorist suspects on secret prison ships:

The UN's special investigator on terrorism Manfred Nowak said in Vienna on Tuesday that although the accusations are rumours, the situation is sufficiently serious to merit an official inquiry.

Thugs everywhere deserve a pass but the US must be investigated. It's a funny old world.