Since July 2009 Shane Bauer and Joshua Fattal have been behind bars in Iran. The 29-year-old men were arrested after they were discovered hiking along the Iran-Iraq border.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spoke with Ann Curry in an interview that was broadcast by NBC this morning on the Today Show. He indicated that the two men will be released within the next few days.
Iran’s top leader told Currey that Fattal and Bauer, charged with espionage and sentenced to eight years in prison, will be released as a “humanitarian gesture.”
Bauer, a freelance photojournalist, grew up in Minnesota and California. Fattal, who has lived in Pennsylvania and Oregon, is an environmentalist and educator.
Bauer and Fattal’s attorney said that his clients would be released in exchange for a bail payment of $500,000 each. A third American, Sarah Shourd, was released after paying a like amount in September 2010.
The hikers claim that they innocently strayed over the northern Iraq border in July 2009.
View Ann Curry’s video report below:
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