Berlin ? Without firing a shot, masked German police commandos freed two senior diplomats from armed men who stormed the Iraqi Embassy Tuesday, bringing a bloodless end to a five-hour hostage drama by a previously unknown group opposed to Saddam Hussein.

The commandos clambered over the embassy’s iron fence at dusk, after police tried 20 times to reach the hostage-takers by telephone, police operations commander Martin Textor said. Five people were detained.

Masked German police officers make their way toward the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin. Armed men, pressing for the ouster of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, took the Iraqi ambassador and others in his staff hostage Tuesday inside the embassy.

Police knocked a loaded Czech-made pistol out of the hands of one of the hostage-takers, freeing the two senior diplomats, both of whom were bound, Textor said.

Police said at least one hostage was injured when the group took over the building at 2:25 p.m. In all, four hostages were taken two embassy employees who were released shortly after the siege started, and the charge d’affaires and another envoy, who were freed by German police.

Textor said the hostage-takers fired two shots inside the building during the standoff, corroborating a description by a neighbor, Manfred Charnow, who lives near the embassy and said he heard two volleys.

“The suspects had no chance to put up resistance,” Berlin Interior Minister Ehrhart Koerting told a news conference. “This obviously is a group that is entirely newly founded. It was unknown to authorities here.”

A group calling itself the Democratic Iraqi Opposition of Germany issued a statement claiming responsibility. It said in a statement it had no intention of violence.

“We are taking over the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin and thereby take the first step toward the liberation of our beloved fatherland. Our action is peaceful and limited in time,” said the statement received by two news agencies in Germany. “Our path is the liberation of Baghdad.”

The group said it expected Germans “to understand our cause” because of Germany’s postwar democratic revival after the Nazi era.

The embassy seizure comes as Germany expresses opposition to any U.S.-led military action to remove Saddam, who is accused of trying to develop weapons of mass destruction. The German position has stoked a rare open spat between Washington and one of its chief European allies.

U.S.: Action ‘unacceptable’

Speaking from President Bush’s ranch in Texas, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the administration had no knowledge of or contacts with the dissident group. He said the siege does not help in the goal to eventually overthrowing Saddam.

Supporters of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein celebrate with his portrait in front of the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin. German police commandos on Tuesday stormed the embassy, freeing two captives and bringing a peaceful end to a hostage-taking by a previously unknown dissident group seeking Hussein's ouster.

“We have an unequivocal position that this action is unacceptable, even against a regime that is as evil as Iraq’s,” Fleischer said.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in Washington the hostage-taking wasn’t part of a U.S. strategy against Iraq.

Embassy employees arrived at the three-story building after the standoff ended, and about a dozen came out parading two framed pictures of Saddam Hussein and an Iraqi flag. One man said the hostage-takers had taken down the flag and the pictures when they went inside.

“These people were just playing. They took down the flag and the pictures and went a bit crazy,” said the man, who identified himself as a friend of the acting ambassador. Another man pulled him away from reporters before he could give more details.

Minor injuries

One captive released during the ordeal was a woman who suffered eye irritation when the hostage-takers used tear gas, Textor said. Police at the scene said a second person who went into shock also got out during the standoff.

The Iraqi charge d’affaires was being interviewed by police but the other envoy was in shock, Textor said. Police did not identify the charge d’affaires, but an official diplomatic list names him as Shamil Mohammed.

Police said the five men forced their way into the embassy, barricaded some of the interior doors and threatened the people inside with weapons which also included a hatchet, an electric shock wand and two tear-gas guns.

Green-and-white police cars swarmed into the quiet tree-lined streets of the elegant Zehlendorf neighborhood, in the former American sector of the city, sealing off several blocks about one mile from the U.S. consulate.

In Baghdad, an Iraqi Foreign Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the ministry contacted “German authorities to adopt speedy measures to evacuate the embassy building.”

Police said they were taking fingerprints and looking for evidence inside the embassy, a villa surrounded by high trees and a 7-foot-high fence.

The Deutsche Welle television channel said it had spoken by telephone with the hostage-takers, who claimed that 20 people had occupied the building.

Despite the dissident group’s claim of responsibility, German investigators were trying to establish exactly who the five hostage-takers were.

“Details about their motives, what the background was whether it was political or perhaps only commercial are speculative,” Textor said. “We have to leave that to the investigation.”

He said the hostage-takers made no demands.

In London, a spokesman for the opposition Iraqi National Congress said the Iraqi Democratic Opposition of Germany appeared to be a new group, founded several months ago. He was not familiar with its members.

The group’s statement, written in nearly flawless German, said the embassy occupation was designed to “make the German people, its organizations and political forces aware that our people have the will to freedom and will put it into practice.”

“This is an act of those mercenaries who live abroad,” Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz said in Baghdad. “It will not affect the embassy nor the great, strong Iraq.”

The new Iraqi diplomatic mission opened on July 17 after moving from Bonn, the former West German capital.