Iran state television has broadcast video showing the recently freed British navy crew playing games, chatting, laughing and watching television during their captivity.

Tehran said the footage shown on Sunday refuted claims made by the soldiers two days earlier that they had been mistreated.

The crew said they had been blindfolded, isolated in cold stone cells, tricked into fearing execution, and coerced into falsely saying they had entered Iranian waters.

The video clips, which were aired on Iran's state-run Arabic satellite channel Al-Alam, showed several of the sailors and marines dressed in tracksuits playing chess and table tennis, laughing and chatting.

Other short clips showed them watching football on television and eating at a long dining table that had vases filled with flowers on it.

The newscaster said the video proved "the sailors had complete liberty during their detention, which contradicts what the sailors declared after they arrived in Britain".

The crew reported having been under constant psychological pressure and being threatened with seven years in prison if they did not say they intruded into Iranian waters.

PHOTO CAPTION

Felix Carman, one of the 15 British Navy Marines detained in Iran, speaks alongside Adam Sperry and Simon Massey during a news conference at RMB Chivenor in Devon on April 6, 2007. (Reuters)