Reports were controversial over the situation of the Lebanese pilgrims who were kidnapped last May by Syria militants. Meanwhile, reports over the release of the Iranian pilgrims who were kidnapped on Saturday were denied.

Reports were controversial over the situation of the Lebanese pilgrims who were kidnapped last May by Syria militants. Meanwhile, reports over the release of the Iranian pilgrims who were kidnapped on Saturday were denied on Sunday.

Some media reports said that a group of militants had attacked their place of detention, while others said two of them had escaped.

But the writer in al-Akhbar Lebanese daily, Fidaa Itani, who met one of the pilgrims, said that they were in a good situation and nothing was concerning regarding the area they have been in.

Itani noted that the head of the group which kidnapped the pilgrims, the so-called Abu Ibrahim, had promised to release the abductees in ten days.

Earlier on Saturday media reports said that the 48 Iranian pilgrims who were kidnapped on the airport road in Damascus were all freed.

However on Sunday, al-Arabiya television aired footage it said it had obtained from Syrian militants of Iranians kidnapped in Damascus.

Militants from the so-called “Free Syrian Amry” had "captured 48 of the shabiha (militiamen) of Iran who were on a reconnaissance mission in Damascus," said a man dressed as an FSA officer in the video screened by the Dubai-based channel.

"During the investigation, we found that some of them were officers in the Revolutionary Guards," he added.

Meanwhile, a source in the Iranian embassy in Beirut denied that the Iranian pilgrims were released, saying the issue was being pursued.

For his part, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi telephoned his Turkish counterpart, Ahmet Davutoglu, late Saturday to request his assistance, the state television website reported.
"During a telephone conversation, Ali Akbar Salehi asked Ahmet Davutoglu for Turkey's immediate intervention to liberate the Iranian pilgrims held hostage in Syria," it said.

Davutoglu responded by promising "to study the issue and to carry out efforts as in previous cases," the website added.