By Nedra Pickler,Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – President Bush said Thursday that “many questions” have been raised by allegations of some former American hostages that Iran’s president-elect was one of their captors a quarter century ago.

“I have no information,” Bush said in an interview with foreign reporters ahead of a trip to Scotland next week. “But obviously his involvement raises many questions.” The hostage comments were first brought to light by The AP.

Bush’s national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, said the administration has followed the career of Iranian president-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has been serving as the hard-line mayor of Tehran.

He said they are “looking to see what’s in the files,” but he would not disclose what the U.S. government may know about any role Ahmadinejad had in the 1979 hostage-taking crisis at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and whether he is one of the captors pictured in photos from the crisis.

“At this point no determination has been made,” Hadley said. “We need to get the facts. These are allegations that have come forward. They are allegations at the present time.”

Former hostages Chuck Scott, David Roeder, William J. Daugherty and Don A. Sharer told The Associated Press that after seeing Ahmadinejad on television, they have no doubt he was one of the hostage-takers. Two other ex-hostages, Kevin Hermening and William A. Gallegos, said they reached the same conclusion after looking at photos. Associates of Ahmadinejad denied the president-elect took part in the seizure of the embassy or in holding Americans hostage.

In Maine, former hostage Moorehead Kennedy, who lives in Mount Desert, said Thursday he never saw Ahmadinejad during his captivity in Tehran.

“I never saw this guy that I can remember,” Moorehead said. “I saw someone else who was a leader. I think they kind of divided us up.” Kennedy added that he could not rule out the possibility Ahmadinejad was in charge of another group of captives. He said the captors either concealed their names or just gave their first names.

The hostage-taking, which came in reprisal for Washington’s refusal to surrender ousted Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi for trial there, contributed substantially to then-President Jimmy Carter’s defeat by Ronald Reagan in the 1980 election.

Militant students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. The shah had fled Iran earlier that year after he was overthrown by the Islamic Revolution.

At the State Department, spokesman Sean McCormack would not say whether the United States would attempt to discuss the situation directly with Iran. There are no direct U.S. relations with Iran, but diplomats from the two countries have participated in joint meetings involving other nations.

Some other hostages could not identify Ahmadinejad and several former students among the hostage-takers also said they did not believe that Ahmadinejad had taken part in it.

Bush suggested these questions are not his primary concern since Ahmadinejad was elected. Instead, he said, he wants to ensure that Britain, France and Germany, who have been negotiating with Iran to stop its alleged nuclear ambitions, make absolutely clear to Ahmadinejad that a nuclear-armed Iran will not be tolerated.

“We’ve got a new man who’s assumed power and he must hear a focused message,” the president said. “That’s where my attention is focused right now.”

Ahmadinejad was a member of the Office of Strengthening Unity, the student organization that planned the embassy takeover, but he was opposed to taking the U.S. Embassy, several of his associates said.

One of his aides, Meisan Rowhani, told the AP from Tehran that Ahmadinejad was asked during recent private meetings if he had a role in the hostage taking. Rowhani said he replied, “No. I believed that if we do that the world will swallow us.”

Rowhani said Ahmadinejad said during the recent meeting that he stopped opposing the embassy seizure after the revolution’s leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, expressed support for it. But the president-elect said he never took part.

Mohammad Ali Sayed Nejad, a longtime friend of the president-elect, said that in 1979, “Ahmadinejad had focused his fight against communism and Marxism and he was one of the opponents of seizing the U.S. Embassy. He was a constant opponent.”

Abbas Abdi, the leader of the hostage-takers, said Ahmadinejad definitely did not take part in the seizure. Abdi has since become a leading supporter of reform and sharply opposed Ahmadinejad. “He was not part of us,” Abdi said.

Another of the hostage-takers, Bijan Adibi, said Ahmadinejad “was not involved. There was no one by that name among the students who took part in the U.S. Embassy seizure.”

Adibi said it’s clear from photos, which show a blindfolded American hostage next to a bearded man of about the same height, that the man could not be Ahmadinejad, who stands at 5 feet 2 inches.

“Look at every picture of Ahmadinejad today and he is at least a head shorter. In this picture this man is the height of the American,” Adibi said.

Some former hostages couldn’t be sure about their captors. Former Marine embassy guard Paul Lewis of Sidney, Ill., said he thought Ahmadinejad looked vaguely familiar when he saw a picture of him on the news last week, but “my memories were more of the gun barrel, not the people behind it.”

“I cannot positively identify the individual. When I was interrogated, I was blindfolded and shackled,” said Alan Golancinski, one of the former hostages who is retired and now lives in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.

Scott, Roeder, Daugherty and Sharer said they have been exchanging e-mails since seeing Ahmadinejad emerge as a serious contender in Iran’s elections.

“He was extremely cruel,” said Sharer, of Bedford, Ind. “He’s one of the hard-liners. So that tells you where their government’s going to stand for the next four to five years.”

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Associated Press writers Ali Akbar Dareini in Tehran, Russ Bynum in Savannah, Ga., Aaron Beard in Raleigh, N.C., Amanda Keim in Phoenix, Ariz., Deanna Wrenn in Indianapolis, Robert Imrie in Wausau, Wis., and Erin Gartner in Denver contributed to this report.

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