There is a story dominating the news here this morning which I find amazing for what it says about media spin rather than the story itself. A British couple and an Australian friend of theirs were arrested near an island on the Iranian coast of the Persian Gulf aboard their sailboat. They were interrogated and held for 13 days and then released.
I heard a live interview with Mr Wise on BBC Radio 4 this morning. He sounded like a reasonable bloke and had no harsh words for the Iranians, praising them for being uniformly courteous and considerate, except that they were detained against their will and not allowed immediate access to the Foreign Office.
The Press Association headlines this as "Couple's 'Mental Torture' in Iran". They don't seem to get the irony of the contrast between descriptions of polite treatment, courteous interrogation and 5 star luxury accommodation with the treatment of US detainees. Hmmm.
I was shocked later to see the "mental torture" headline in connection with the story as it was nowhere alleged in any of the comments I heard from Mr Wise himself.
Guess what? He never said it that I can find. The anonymous Press Association journalist said it for him.
A British couple held without charge for 13 days by Iranian authorities said they were subjected to "mental torture".
Rupert and Linda Wise have now been released after being stopped and detained at gunpoint by the Iranian navy as they sailed towards the disputed island of Abu Musa from their home in Dubai.
Mr Wise said their ordeal began on October 28 when two gunboats came "roaring out" towards them and slammed into both sides of their boat as they headed for the island - a territory that is being claimed by both Iran and the United Arab Emirates. He said: "We had about 10 armed men on the boat, shouting at us and informing us that we had done some sort of crime. We were apprehended and tied to the quay and put under guard."
Mr Wise told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that they were treated well and not physically harmed.
Along with an Australian yachtsman, Paul Shulton, they were taken to the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas for questioning by five or six interrogation teams. But they did not know why they had been seized, Mr Wise said. He said at first the Iranians might have thought they were spies, and then they thought the trio were investigating the ownership of the island. They were never charged.
Maybe Mr Wise recognises the difference between "mental torture" and being arrested cruising in another nation's waters that your own nation seems determined to malign and possibly attack or invade. Maybe he sees the difference between his treatment and the treatment of detainees in Britain and various American gulags. I don't know.
It stinks that the Press Association can make shit up and get away with it - getting it published in hundreds of papers across the globe.
These people were in disputed waters of a nation which sees itself as under attack from Britain and the United States. Iran has alleged that Britain is behind the bombs going off in Ahwaz. Even so, the Iranians acted politely, considerately and within their own and international laws.
Would the Americans have behaved so well? Would the British? I'm ashamed to say I think not.