U.S. Tries for Dialogue With Hezbollah Chief

WASHINGTON — The Reagan Administration, increasingly concerned that fratricidal warfare between Shia Muslim militias in Lebanon will intensify the danger to American hostages, tried Monday to open a new channel of communication to the radical leader of the Hezbollah faction.

State Department spokesman Charles Redman said that the U.S. government “welcomes” a statement by Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah that countries with citizens held hostage in Lebanon should open direct talks with the abductors.

He said Washington has been ready for many months to talk to any group about the safety and eventual release of American hostages, but he re-emphasized the U.S refusal to make concessions to terrorists.

Fadlallah, known as the spiritual leader of the fundamentalist, pro-Iranian Hezbollah militia, was quoted last week by Agence France-Presse, the French news agency, as saying that the hostage crisis can be resolved only by direct talks with the abductors. Most of the nine American and nine other hostages are believed to be held by Hezbollah or one of its many affiliated groups.

Iran-Style Republic

Hezbollah, which wants to establish an Iranian-style Islamic republic in Lebanon, is engaged in bitter fighting with Amal, a more moderate Shia militia backed by Syria. U.S. officials are concerned that Syria, which has sought to mediate an end to the conflict, ultimately may commit its forces on the side of Amal.

If that should happen, it would greatly increase the military pressure on Hezbollah and could make it impossible for Hezbollah to continue to hold the hostages, therefore forcing it to either release or execute them.

Redman was extremely deferential in his handling of Fadlallah’s proposal.

“We welcome this pronouncement from this clerical leader of the Shia community in Lebanon, which we have read and studied with great interest,” he said.

“Let me restate once again the U.S. position on hostage discussion, which Secretary (of State George P.) Shultz articulated in a Feb. 12 speech, in which he said: ‘Our government has repeatedly made clear that we will talk to anyone, to any group, to any government, about the well-being and release of the Americans still held hostage in Lebanon.’ ”

No Concession to Terrorists

Nevertheless, Redman said, there is “no change at all” in the longstanding U.S. policy against paying ransom or making other concessions to terrorists.

A State Department official said Fadlallah had not contacted the U.S. government directly. The official added that Redman’s remarks at the regular State Department press briefing constituted the only American reply to Fadlallah. However, the official said, if the sheik is serious, he will contact the U.S. Embassy in Beirut with further suggestions.

Meanwhile, Redman dismissed as “unmitigated nonsense” a report in the Kuwaiti newspaper Al Anbaa that Deputy Secretary of State John C. Whitehead met Iranian officials in Algeria last week. The newspaper said Whitehead told the Iranians that the U.S. government would free Iranian assets blocked in the United States, lift a trade embargo and renew diplomatic relations in exchange for the release of the American hostages.

The U.S. effort to open communications with Fadlallah came a little more than three years after he escaped an assassination attempt in Beirut. A car bomb outside Fadlallah’s headquarters killed more than 80 people but missed its apparent target.

In “Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA, 1981-1987,” journalist Bob Woodward writes that the CIA trained and supported the would-be assassins. The White House and the CIA have denied this.