The London-based brother of the Iranian general who personally ordered the kidnapping of the 15 servicemen in the Shatt al-Arab waterway condemned Britain’s ingratitude after their release last week.

Salman Rahim Safavi, an academic and brother of Major-General Yahya Rahim Safavi, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, said: “We sent the boys back as a gift to the British people and Tony Blair didn’t even say thank you.”

Safavi, who is in close contact with his brother in Iran, warned that the Tehran leadership has been angry about British reaction since the hostages arrived home and hinted at a tougher response in future.

He said in his first interview: “Tony Blair is unfair. Only a day after we released his soldiers Blair denounced Iran and described us as a country that supports terrorism. This is unacceptable.

“Blair is just like George W Bush. After we cooperated with America in Afghanistan against the Taliban, Bush called us part of the axis of evil.”

His closeness to the thinking of the leadership of the Revolutionary Guards makes his remarks significant. General Safavi is regarded as a strongman and a key player in Tehran.

His brother, who has lived in London for several years, alleged that there had been several recent unreported incursions by the Royal Navy into waters that Iran regards as its territory.

“It was not the first time your navy entered our territory,” he said. “It has happened three times in the past and when it happened for the fourth time, we said enough is enough. It is not a joke.”

The Sunday Times revealed last week that the general had told Iran’s Supreme National Security Council that the hostage crisis was getting out of hand and warned its members that the Britons should be freed to defuse tension in the Gulf. They were released six days later.

A source confirmed this weekend: “It was General Safavi who recommended to the supreme religious leader [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] that the captives should be released. Even though he was the one who gave the order to grab the guys, he believed that the timing wasn’t good for Iran to keep them longer than necessary.”

The general commands more than 350,000 soldiers and the guards’ special agents who operate from Iranian embassies all over the world. They have been accused of conducting terrorist attacks in Germany, Argentina, Israel, Lebanon and Iraq. Apart from their secret military apparatus, the guards also control a television station and lucrative business ventures.

The general’s brother denied charges that the British hostages had been treated badly. “We showed the prisoners in good shape and they had good food,” he said. “We only showed them on TV to prove they were in good shape. We didn’t want to humiliate them.”

In his view the release of the hostages was a clear message of conciliation.

“We want peace and dialogue,” he said. “We showed that we can protect our borders, but at the same time we don’t want any unnecessary tension with the West.”

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